Freaks, Geeks and Everything Else in Between
by freerangeegghead
Summary: In which Rachel and Santana accidentally make a wish that turn their lives upside down. Rachel Berry, Santana Lopez, Quinn Fabray, Brittany S. Pierce. Brittana, Quintanna,etc. Mentions of canon, from season 1 through 5, but no spoilers. Extremely extreme A/U. Warning: Girlpeen. No smut. Fantasy, humor, fun, friendship,maybe romance...Awesomeness galore.
1. Chapter 1

_**Summary: In which Rachel and Santana accidentally make a wish that turn their lives upside down.**_

_**Pairings: Mentions canon pairings, but eventual pairing part of plot. **_

_**Spoilers: Mentions of canon, from season 1 through 5, but no spoilers. Extremely extreme A/U.**_

_**Warning/s: GIRLPEEN. No smut. No secks. Just a story. Much plot and exposition. Very sorry.**_

_**Disclaimer: Don't own Glee or its characters or any of the references mentioned herein. So sad.**_

* * *

Rachel Berry was supposed to have a good day.

She got up extra early to exercise, shower, do her vocalizations, get her breakfast. She had to prepare for the State Math Olympics, the State Physics Olympics, work on her project for the Science Fair, the debate competition, attend meetings for Math Club, Foreign Languages Club, Classical Music, Science Club, the X-Club, AV Club and the Sound of Music rehearsal later. She'd stayed up all night doing her homework. But the biggest reason why she got up early is because today was the day her favorite singer and actor Finn Hudson was coming to Lima, doing an album launch and some autograph signing. She'd worn her best knit sweater, her best skirt, her best tube socks, her favorite headband and her lucky blouse just for this occasion. She gets to the bus stop extra early so she doesn't have to sit at the back and so she can work on what she needs to do before she goes to Finn Hudson day at the mall, right after her part-time job at the Lima Bean. She takes a look at the posters and cut pictures of Finn Hudson on her wall, blows a kiss for good luck and smiles.

Everything was going to be perfect.

Little did she know her life was about to change that day.

But then as she rushes through McKinley, Santana Lopez happens.

Well, more specifically, Santana Lopez tosses a slushie on her face.

* * *

Rachel Berry hated Santana Lopez.

Scratch that.

Rachel Berry _loathed_ Santana Lopez.

She _despised_ her.

She _detested_ her.

She hated her even more now that there is ice and grape juice and slush all over her face and clothes and the perpetrator is disappearing down the hallway in her varsity jacket and jeans, being followed by the captain of the team, Quinn Fabray, her best friend, Brittany S. Pierce and pretty much everybody else.

As the cold seeped down her blouse, and into her bra and she starts to shiver from the wetness, she sighs and heads toward the restroom, where her best friend Kurt Hummel is waiting to help her remove the offending stuff on her face, clothes and body.

It wasn't the first time Santana Lopez had done it. Santana and Quinn had always had an animosity with Rachel Berry since junior high, but it seemed to have escalated as they got older, with Santana shoving her against lockers at every opportunity, throwing slushies at her, once, during Phys Ed, "accidentally" hitting her with the volleyball, accidentally knocking down her tray, or putting out her foot so Rachel stumbles and have the other kids laugh at her. It doesn't help of course that Santana and Quinn lead the student body in calling her "freak", "loser", "nerd", "geek" and have suggested various ways for her to contribute to the world, number one of which is to "get sterilized".

"You know what can make you feel better?" Kurt says now, voice high pitched and cracking as he leans over to wash the excess ice from Rachel's hair. The overwhelming cologne he insists on wearing, which is like a confusing mixture of Axe and CK1, combined with his confusingly mismatched clothes – gives Rachel a headache, but he's at least here, so she smiles, encouraging him. "Retail therapy! And Finn Hudson day at the mall!"

* * *

Santana Lopez thinks she has the most awesome life ever. Right now, lying on the couch in the Fabrays' basement, with Quinn Fabray, captain of the Cheerios team on top of her, slowly and teasingly grinding against her, lips nibbling behind Santana's ear, against Santana's neck, then leaving a trail of kisses all the way to her chest, Santana thinks she has the best of both worlds. Quinn smells like sunshine and grass and the promise of spring time and that cologne that Santana really likes. Her lips feel soft and delicious and juicy and she does this thing where her gaze kind of turns all shy and sexy and it's drives Santana hot. Santana has her eyes closed, is breathing heavily, heat coursing through her veins and she feels herself harden and she feels her face flush and Quinn stops, hovering above her and Santana keeps her eyes closed, hoping the kissing won't stop, but no lips press against her, so she opens her eyes and she sees Quinn's hazel eyes staring at her, a smirk and an annoyed look on her face.

"Think of the mailman," Quinn says tightly.

"What?"

"Think of the mailman!" Quinn says now.

"Alright, alright, _geez_," Santana says now, trying to think of the mailman that she almost killed that day her best friend Puck was trying to teach her how to drive.

Quinn leans back, sitting on Santana's legs, looking at Santana intently. Santana swallows, waiting for Quinn to blow up on her, but Quinn says, "You haven't been coming to Celibacy Club meetings."

Santana resists rolling her eyes. "Why should I go? And I keep ending up paired with Puck or whatever and it's just fucking annoying."

"Language, San," Quinn says, before she leans over and kisses Santana on the lips. "You're coming tomorrow, right?" Before Santana could answer, Quinn's hand comes up to brush Santana's cheek and before Santana could react, Quinn's hand is on her crotch. Before Santana could savor that moment, Quinn removes her hand, smirks at Santana, leans back, puts her palms together instead and says, "Let's pray" before she closes her eyes.

Santana rolls her eyes, leans back and sighs.

Everything would have been perfect, had it not been for the fact that Quinn Fabray keeps praying every time things get hot and heavy. At the rate they're going, she'd probably get lucky when the sun turns blood red and the world ends. Lord knows Quinn already thinks they're going to hell for making out like a bunch of rabbits. At least rabbits get a lot more play than she does. Fuck, the stupid thing is that there is more teasing and no _fucking, _like, at all. Really, after this she should probably just call Brittany – let it all out of her system for something.

* * *

An hour and a few lies later, in which Santana manages to not roll her eyes repeatedly while Quinn prayed with her (one of the perks, Quinn claims, of both of them being Catholic)Santana hurriedly drives to Brittany's house, Brittany ruins their making out time when she says, in the middle of it all, that they need to talk.

And Santana hates talking. She tells Brittany, "I don't really talk, _during_."

And Brittany says, "I'm starting to feel weird about this."

Santana screws up her face. "Why?"

Brittany sighs. "Because you're with Quinn. And Quinn's my friend. And it's not nice."

"And you're with Sam, so whatever," Santana says now. "And before that you were with Artie and..." Her voice trails off as she looks at the mirror where she is currently pulling her hair up into a ponytail. "And besides, you never had a problem with this before. I mean you seemed okay with it before."

Brittany is silent as she pulls her long legs up before her and rests her cheeks on her knees. "Well, maybe I'm done being okay with it now."

Santana doesn't know what to say to that. She pauses, before she resumes tying her hair and turns around to pick things up from off the floor. She can feel Brittany's blue eyes boring into the back of her skull. She refuses to look her in the eye.

"Listen, don't you want to do this, like with feelings or whatever?" Brittany says.

Santana scoffs. "Why?"

"Because with feelings it's always _better_ and stuff."

Santana is silent as she regards Brittany coolly. Brittany doesn't flinch however. Brittany has been best friends with Santana since forever, like even longer than Puck even. Brittany gets to get away with everything when it came to Santana. Brittany looks at her steadily now and says, "I mean, I know with your..._condition_...you think no one's going to take you seriously or whatever...but I care about you and...I want you to be happy and we'd already decided we were going to be friends and I don't want to ruin that and...what are we even doing, San? I don't want to hurt Sam..."

Santana looks at Brittany like she's just grown an extra head and like the she's said something scary and she suddenly just wants to leave her house. After a silence, Santana looks at her and says, "You don't know what you're talking about..."

Santana's voice breaks and she feels a lump forming in her throat and she tries to swallow it and there is a rage that bubbles through the surface now and she hates it when people are condescending to her and all she wants to start picking stuff up and throwing them against the wall but instead she rushes out of the house, wishing she hadn't gone to Brittany in the first place.

She's not going to cry, she tells herself. As she drives back to her house and rushes up to her room and slams the door as hard as she can and drops back on her bed, she tells herself she's not going to cry. Halfway through sobbing through her pillow, she still tells herself she's not going to cry.

Brittany tries to call and text her repeatedly. She refuses to talk to her.

The next day, she relents and lets Brittany convince her to go meet that strange sub they keep getting - Miss Holiday.

* * *

Santana's annoyed the next day, which is Halloween, when they all file into the yellow bus for one of those field trips that they never really get anything out of. It's cloudy and cold and there's a breeze blowing and she pulls her jacket with the Cheerios on it closer to her as she follows the other seniors to the yellow bus. She hates field trips. She sees a boy she really hates and pushes him away from her and immediately feels better.

Mr. Schuester, Spanish and Social Studies teacher, and overall loser who's wife is some kind harpy who works at "Sheets and Things". He probably married his high school sweetheart or something. _Loser_. Mr. Schuester says something about having buddies for the trip which is kind of funny because they're seniors and don't really need someone to hold their hands or whatever. Rachel Berry comes in, class president, president of almost all clubs, class overachiever, class valedictorian, member of the Honors Society comes in with that stupid button on her chest that says she is class president, and Santana just rolls her eyes. Rachel Berry looks at everyone's seat and all the seats are full, except for Santana's and the seats at the back, where all the losers usually sit during these stupid school trips. Everyone makes to look as if they are busy and makes to ignore Rachel and Rachel keeps that stupid smile on her face as she walks down the aisle, and she stops, unsure, infront of Santana's seat, but Santana just glares at her and growls, "This seat is - ".

Santana doesn't finish the sentence as Rachel is shoved aside and Quinn sits beside her, crossing her arms and legs and smirking at Rachel before she turns to Santana and says, "We should pray for a safe trip." Before Quinn could start, Brittany bounds up to them and the two squeeze together to make room for Brittany.

Tina Cohen-Chang, the Asian girl with the blue hair and the goth look and at the moment, a basket of fortune cookies, is going around with boyfriend Mike Chang, delivering cookie fortunes. Tina Cohen Chang looks embarrassed. Mike Chang just looks happy, proud and apologetic, muttering about how his grandmother had an extra bag of fortune cookies and wanted Mike to bring some for his friends and Rachel can hear Tina muttering in irritation, "For once, I want a date that involves no fortune cookies, or soup with chicken feet in them, or your grandmother making me eat stinky tofu or drinking some stinking herbal tea to improve my marriage chi!"

Mike just looks at her, confused. "What are you talking about? Granny is awesome!"

"I just fucking want soup with no chicken feet in them!" Tina shouts at him, making Mike and the rest of the class shut up.

Brittany leans over though and says, "Um, I think I'll have one of those!" She smiles at Mike now. "Your granny should meet my Nana!"

Quinn leans over then and says, "San and I will have some, too, please, thanks."

Rachel doesn't even realize that someone has put a fortune cookie in her hand as she backs away and turns to the last seat at the back, by the window. As Santana, Quinn and Brittany start to laugh, Rachel brings out her iPod and starts to listen to Broadway songs. As the bus pulls out of McKinley and into the main road, Lea Salonga's version of Les Miserables' "On My Own", starts to play and Rachel feels the tears pool on her eyes. She takes a deep breath and tries not to cry. As she tries to open her fortune cookie, she wishes that her life could change.

Because, seriously, her life _sucks_.

* * *

The museum is a bust.

Santana doesn't need to be a genius to know that.

Santana doesn't really see the appeal of looking at rocks, sorry, _relics_, that have indecipherable writing on it and marvel at, like, culture or whatever.

Santana stares at one such old statue, and Quinn comes up behind her, her fingers brushing lightly against Santana's hip, the touch gone before Santana can enjoy it. "Penny for you thoughts?"

Santana looks at her and smiles before she turns back to the statue and says, "I don't understand what this all means..." She looks back at Quinn again. "Damn all this...culture...or whatever.."

Quinn smirks. "Grades, San, and a paper."

Santana laughs. "That really doesn't make sense to me at all."

Quinn looks at her then. "Let me put in words that you can understand." She smirks at her then. "You go around here, pretend to like stuff, write that paper, and I let you touch one of my boobs."

Santana looks back at her and a slow smile spreads on her face. "For real?"

Quinn rolls her eyes. "For real."

Santana has a mischievous glint on her face. "Which one?"

Quinn knits her eyebrows. "What do you mean which one?"

Santana grins, "I mean, which breast can I touch?"

Quinn looks at her, annoyed. "Does it matter?"

Santana's grin grows wider. "Hell, yeah, it matters!" As Quinn just shakes her head, Santana says, " 'Cause I totally would prefer to touch your right breast. I think it's bigger."

"God, Santana, you're certifiable, you know that?"

Santana only grins. "You know it."

Quinn shakes her head and just laughs.

"Where's Britt?" Santana asks.

Quinn shrugs. "I dunno. But lemme check. I'm sure she's around here somewhere. She says she wants to take a look at the animal totems or whatever."

Quinn touches her elbow again and leaves Santana staring at the statue. After a few moments, she sees Rachel Berry, with notebook and pen in hand, furiously scribbling in her notebook, eyeglasses perched on her massive nose because of course she won't wear contacts or get a surgery like everyone else who wants to fit in. _Why can't she be not a nerd like everyone else? _Santana thinks, annoyed. Rachel Berry happens to glance in her direction and quickly averts her gaze, slowly backing away as if afraid of Santana.

Santana smirks. She loves it when people cower in fear before her.

* * *

It was a magnificent statue.

It was old and crumbling and chipped and made of wood and stood about twenty meters tall. Or so Rachel thought as she stood staring at the statue. The officials of Lima, Ohio, from Congressman Burt Hummel, Kurt Hummel's dad, to Mr. Schuester, who is a staunch defender of the arts and had gone all the way to Congress to fight to keep at least part of the funding for New Directions, had fought to have the statue, unearthed during a dig in and around the town, along with other cultural artifacts and implements, which testified to the rich and buried cultural heritage of the town before the white settlers settled in on the town and drove the Native Americans out. It was a massive two-headed statue that reminded her of the heads on Easter Island. It was a totem of some sort – the heads a scary, horrifying mixture of monstrous and happy, eyes large and hollow, mouth drawn wide and gaping, as if in a silent scream, their bodies small, arms and legs miniature. The museum curator and archeologists had worked tirelessly during the summer to unearth all the artifacts and had dedicated a whole section of the small Lima Museum to the artifacts. She tilts her head and screws her eyes beneath her glasses, squinting to see the small square of script that is trying to explain what the statue is all about. The curator and scholars are unsure of this artifact, the explanation says, as it's the first time they'd ever seen one of these. They surmise that it is probably some sort of god or totem, they are unsure. The status is unlike anything they'd ever seen and has opened up a lot of possibilities for conjecture and research about the nature of pre-colonial Native American cultures. It reminds Rachel of the Roman god Janus, if anything actually. Wouldn't that be interesting, she thinks? If the Romans found some way of coming to the New World and introducing their culture and then dying off one by one, killed by something embarrassing like syphilis and modern humans, from Congressman Burt Hummel all the way to Mr. William Schuester are excitedly talking about it like it's the greatest thing since wheels. Rachel sighs. If she didn't need to maintain a 4.0 GPA even though she's received the letter from her schools of choice and all she needs to do now is attend the interview and perform in front of a panel for that drama school, she'd totally have faked an illness instead of being stuck staring at stuff and making a paper out of it later.

Tina comes up beside her, stares up at the statue and mutters, "I don't know which is worse: staring up at some Native American..._stuff_, or staring at some Chinese _stuff_..."

Rachel smiles. "Well, I think culture is a great way to expand my horizons...I mean, if I'm going to be a star someday I'm going to have to..."

Tina laughs. "You are so weird."

Rachel's smile grows wider. "Thanks!"

Tina shakes her head and laughs some more. "Damn all this..._culture_..."

"You can say that again," a voice from behind says. "Look what I found!" she says, showing them both what appeared to be two pairs of pre-colonial bronze earrings.

"You're not supposed to get that!" Rachel automatically says.

"And what, are you going to tell, blabbermouth?" Santana says now, as she puts one earring in her earlobe. "Besides it looks good on me."

"Santana, that's a rare Native American artifact, you can't just...swipe it off the counter or something," Tina says now.

Santana says, "Whatever. Hey, Asian..._dude_."

"It's Tina," Tina says. "Cohen-Chang. I've said that to you like a million times...we've been classmates since..."

Santana looks at her. "I don't care." She looks at Rachel, and says, "Hey, loser. 1989 called, they want your tube socks back. And the deer sweater. And your headband. And pretty much everything about you. In fact, while you're at it, have you ever considered sterilization?"

Rachel looks at her. "Do you ever get tired of tearing people down?"

Santana considers this for a moment before she smirks, and says, "No, not really."

"You are such a bitch," Tina says now, before she realizes she's made a mistake.

Santana turns towards her and smiles. "Shouldn't you be somewhere else eating dim sum and dumplings with other Asian dude?"

Tina glares at her. "_Avada Kedavra!_"

Santana laughs. "Oh my god, did you just try to put some Harry Potter hex on me or something?"

Tina and Rachel stare at Santana in surprise. Santana glares back, defiant.

"What, you want to play that game? _Confringo!_" Santana says.

"_Crucio!_" Tina hisses now.

"_Deletrius!_" Santana says.

"_Prior Incantato!" _Tina says. Before Santana says anything else, Tina quickly says, "_Furnunculus!_"

"_Engorgio!" _Santana playfully says.

"_Erecto!_" Tina says.

Rachel knits her eyebrows. "Oh my god, when you guys say it like that, it just sounds _dirty_ somehow!"

The two ignore Rachel and she sighs and steps back, looking at the statue all the while. As she stares at the empty eyes, she thinks they start to glow a dull red glow. She blinks, takes her eyeglasses off, rubs them, puts them back on again and stares at the empty eyes of the statue. The statue's eyes glow is now fading, it seems like, and Rachel looks at the two people arguing behind her and she says, "You guys probably need to stop now..."

They don't here Rachel as Tina says, "_Expecto Patronum!"_

This time, Rachel thinks the statue glows a really bright red.

"Guys, really, I need you guys need to cut it out," Rachel says nervously, because Tina's voice is getting louder. When they don't, Rachel says, "I wish you'd listen to me..."

"I wish you'd disappear, but that's not ever gonna happen, is it?" Santana says now, breaking off what appears to be some strange Harry Potter spell duel with Tina.

"You're mean, Santana,"Tina says now. "You're a mean girl."

"And you're both a waste of space," Santana says now.

There is a shocked silence now.

"You don't even know us," Rachel says now. "You don't even know me. You don't even know what it's like to be me."

Santana looks at Rachel now with a bored expression on her face. "Whatever, Berry."

"I mean, why are you doing this? Why are you like this?" Rachel demands now, taking a step towards Santana. Santana takes a step back. "Do you like,just take pleasure over other people's miseries? Do you know how hard it is to be us? Do you?"

Santana is quiet, surprised at this outburst as Rachel and Tina are, and Santana says, "You don't know what you're talking about..." When Rachel doesn't say anything, Santana says, "You don't know what it's like to be me, Berry..."

Rachel looks at her then, gaze steady, as she says, "And you don't know what it's like to be me, Santana. In fact, I dare you to live just for one day, under my skin...I bet you wouldn't last a day...so back off..."

Santana smirks now. "Oh, believe me, if you tried to live as me just for one day? You wouldn't last a day either..."

They are silent again, not saying anything. Behind them, they do not notice the statue's eyes glowing red. Then the fluorescent light above flickers on and off for a few seconds, and there's a draft, a mild breeze that Rachel, Santana and Tina feel, which is weird, because the room they are in is enclosed space and it's a controlled environment, the temperature steady and unchanging to delay chemical reactions of artifacts with nature.

Then they all hear Mr. Schuester say, "Alright, you guys, knock it off!" to someone or no one in particular because nobody actually listens to Mr. Schuester – he was probably one of those people who went into teaching believing he could "change the world through art" or education or something. He then comes to the room they are in and announces that they are leaving in a few minutes.

Then they hear another voice, and it's Quinn, calling Santana and Santana sees Mr. Schuester and the curator and she remembers the earring and takes it off her ear and shoves them down the jeans of her pocket to hide them, grins at Quinn and leaves Rachel and Tina behind. Mike comes after, beckoning Tina to come.

Rachel is left alone in the room with the statue, ignored, rejected and forgotten yet again. She bets that if she stayed in this room until the bus left, no one would know she's missing and forgotten until the bus arrives in McKinley. In fact, no one would know or even care until forever, maybe.

She stands there feeling more and more depressed, trying not to cry as this dawns on her. Then she takes a deep breath, composes herself, tries a smile on for size, and marches out of the room proudly. On her way to the door, she steps on something strange and she looks down and it's the other bronze earring,the one Santana stole from one of the other rooms. She leans down and grabs the earring from off the ground, fully intending to return it to the curator's office, but then Mr. Schuester suddenly appears before her and orders her to board the bus immediately. The earring lies forgotten in her pocket until she gets home.

The red glow on the statue glows one more time, before it winks out.

* * *

There is thunder and lightning and later, heavy rains as they make their way back from the museum to the school and home after.

Rachel is wet the minute she takes a step on the parking lot, and again, ignored by the others. Santana, Quinn and Brittany are under their jackets, giggling and smiling, rushing to Santana's car, whilst the others do the same. Rachel, having no car, marches proudly to the bus stop, where the other passengers refuse to sit beside her.

She gets home, sad, lonely and depressed and gets into her bed, thinking it must be nice to be Santana, wishing she could _be_ Santana, just for a day.

She falls asleep to the thunder and lightning and rains outside her window.

* * *

Santana is on her way to her house now.

She comes home to an empty house, yet again. Her mother works three jobs, working at the hospital, at a restaurant, and as tutor at night. Her father is a doctor and sends enough money for her, but her mother wants her own money and is too proud to just ask for help from her father. They've been divorced for a long time and Santana feels that emptiness inside her.

Santana makes her way to her bathroom, takes a quick shower and crawls into her bed, asleep even before she hits the mattress.

Outside the thunder and lightning and rain continue unabated.

* * *

It was another day for Rachel.

Her alarm rings, she gets up, bright and perky, she starts to exercise, shower, have a non-vegan breakfast and go to school. This day is different though.

Rachel wakes up feeling a headache coming on.

She stumbles onto her bathroom sleepy and tired.

She catches a glimpse of herself in the bathroom mirror and the image doesn't immediately register before she comes back to the mirror and stares at herself again.

"_Oh, my god."_

Rachel stares at herself in the mirror.

Except it's not her face that's staring back.

It's Santana Lopez's face staring back at her.

Rachel stares at the mirror for what seems like hours, and then she has this brilliant idea of looking down at her crotch and what she sees there makes her scream.

Then Rachel Berry faints.

* * *

It's just another ordinary day for Santana Lopez as she blearily stumbles into her bathroom. Why the fuck is it so bright here? She thinks, squinting against the sun.

As she passes by the mirror, she doesn't immediately register that a different image is being reflected back. But when she stands in front of the toilet bowl to take a leak and realizes that there isn't actually any thing to pull out or pee from, the sleepiness dissipates and all she can think of is, _What the fuck?_ And _Where's my fucking penis?!_

* * *

_**A/N: Dear readers, yes, yes, I've crossed over the dark side and have finally written a g!p story. I'm working through most of the fan fic tropes just for fun. :) I wrote this to work through the stress and brick wall I encountered over the other stories. They will be updated as soon as possible. This won't take long only 5 chapters (or less). **_

_**You like? Read and review. ;) Thanks for reading!**_


	2. Chapter 2

Rachel wakes up from her fainting spell fully expecting that whatever she woke up to was a bad dream.

But she comes to and she opens her eyes and puts her hands to her eyes and she realizes she's still in her nightmare.

She puts her hands to her face as she gets up from off the floor, the panic and anxiety pooling in her gut and sees tan hands with the pretty, immaculately trimmed fingernails and says, "These are not my hands!" looks at the muscles on her arms and says, "These are not my muscles", looks at the abs on her stomach, mutters, "These are _so_ not my abs", she looks down at the rest of the body, sees the breasts, and thinks, "These boobs are _definitely_ not mine!" then she looks towards the mirror, at the face of Santana Lopez staring back at her, with those beautiful, dark, smoky eyes, those long eyelashes, those high cheekbones, those pretty lips and she feels nauseated, feels dizzy as she tells herself, "These are _definitely_ not mine" and then she starts to pace around the room chanting "I must be dreaming, I must be dreaming, I'll wake up, I'll wake up, Rachel, wake _up_!"and she starts to subtly hyperventilate and the panic rises up to such a intensity she feels like she cannot breathe then, she looks down, she sees herself in a tank top and boxer shorts and she sees something poking out of the boxer shorts and as her heart beats so hard, and so fast as she slowly grabs the waistband and peeks in, she thinks, "Oh, my god, those are _definitely_ not mine!" and as it sinks in, she says, "Santana has a _penis_?" She takes another look again at the offending appendage and tells herself, "Wait, is that a small penis? Or just a large clitoris?"

* * *

Meanwhile, on the other side of town, Santana Lopez is pacing back and forth in the room, not _her_ room, it's pink and the bed is a four-poster bed with a fucking canopy and soft, fluffy, pink pillows and soft Hello Kitty sheets and a pink comforter, and pink curtains and a pink bathroom with pink tiles and a mirror with a pink frame and fuck, everything is in fucking _pink_. She is freaking out and confused and she doesn't know what to do. The room is full of posters and pictures of the reality star, singer and actor Finn Hudson, complete with mugs and pens and pillows and magazines with his face on it. She makes a face. She's not a big fan of the guy – nothing personal, she just isn't into his music, his singing, his face. There's something strongly fan-girlish and vaguely stalker-ish and pathetic about Rachel Berry's inexplicable obsession with Finn Hudson. That loser so needs a fucking life, she thinks. Except now Santana Lopez _is_ Rachel Berry, so now people will think she is a geek and now people will think she has no _life_. _Fuck_. Fuck you, Rachel Berry, fuck _you_, she thinks.

There is a massive portrait of Rachel Berry in the style of a retro 1970s style dress in soft light that makes her look like some kind of soft core porn star. Santana would laugh had this been a different situation. Santana is wearing pink teddy bear pajamas which she angrily removes, ripping off the top and pulling down the pants and rummages around the drawer for some shorts and a tee shirt. She finds a tight, black Grease shirt and shorts and resumes pacing.

As she catches a glimpse of herself in the mirror, she is reminded again why she is pacing around the room like a caged animal, and she thinks to herself, "Oh my god, I'm a fucking hobbit! And I'm fucking _white_! And I'm..." she stops and looks down and realizes she has a vagina and she thinks, "But I have a vagina and that is awesome even though it's Rachel Berry's vagina...okay, _stop_! _Focus_, Santana Lopez, focus! Where the fuck are my _boobs_?! Where's my _penis?" _

As she tries to figure out where her penis went and why she is in this particular place at the moment, she is having a major freak out and she finds her face red-hot with panic and anxiety and it's all she can do to scream and tear everything down and punch something or _someone_.

Okay, so it's not like she's particularly attached to her penis. She's lived with it all her life. It's been a source of frustration, embarrassment, deep shame, depression, despair, and the reason for why her parents had divorced. When she had been born, her genitals were too ambiguous and she couldn't be classified as either strictly male or female. Her father, the doctor and his doctor surgeon friends had planned on performing a corrective surgery on her, reassigning her as male, because the size of her appendage hadn't fit what was normally expected. Her mother, exhausted from childbirth and deliriously happy at her birth and also fiercely protective because she almost lost her life giving birth to Santana, had found out just in time, and vehemently opposed the surgery. That started the many instances in which the Lopezes realized they had differing opinions about how to raise Santana, and the subsequent downward spiral of her parents' marriage.

Her mother had wanted to raise her as an androgynous child, giving Santana the choice to choose which gender she preferred – hence the ambiguous name – while her father wanted her to live as either a boy or a girl. There was never any gray area with her father, no middle ground, no compromises, and it's been a constant theme of Santana's life that she has always been a disappointment to her father.

Her childhood days were lived with her father insisting she live as a boy, which resulted in her being a very temperamental little boy, always picking fights and bullying the other kids and always being sent to the principal's office or being given detention or being grounded, not knowing why and not even understanding why she was angry and confused. It didn't really get better when she got older. Her parents eventually realized they had irreconcilable differences – first and foremost how to raise Santana and they'd both decided it had been best for both of them if they went their separate ways. So they eventually got divorced, her father moved away, and she and her mother stayed behind. Family members on both sides of the family of course didn't like her, even though nobody outside her family knew about her condition and the one time she attempted to tell her grandmother, her father's mother, that she likes girls, she was promptly disowned and informed never to set foot in her house ever again.

Her mother made sure her father sent her child support for Santana every month, hence the car and the other things that would ensure Santana would not want for anything – but that didn't really make up for anything, and Santana still had that extra appendage she despised but could not bring herself to remove and when she'd had a chance to get a surgery, she chickened out and had a breast augmentation surgery instead.

So anyway, she's never liked her penis, it always seems like more trouble than it's worth, but it was part of her, it was part of who she was, something she despised and condemned and had to live with for the rest of her life and if she'd have wanted to have actively been involved in the waking up some day knowing her penis is gone, she'd have wanted to take control of that part of her life, of her destiny, because so much of her life right now didn't make sense. Has never made sense. So, she'd never kind of thought about what would happen if she actually lost it, and now that it's nowhere to be found, and she's in a body that isn't hers, that she's in a body that is Rachel Berry's, for fuck's sake, she's panicking and hyperventilating and wondering what happened and if this is some dream or nightmare or some drug-induced high she'll eventually wake up from and as she continues to pace around the hideous room.

A knock from behind the door makes her jump, followed by a sing-song, melodious, "Morning, Rachel" and the door is pushed open to reveal a tall, lanky man with ash gray pepper hair and glasses, giving Santana a big smile.

"Hey, uh, sweetie!" the man says. "Breakfast is ready."

She smiles tightly and says, "Okay."

* * *

Breakfast is, for lack of a better word, gross.

Breakfast is non-fat soya milk, some freshly squeezed orange juice, a vegan sandwich, which is pretty much code for tasteless crap between vegan wheatbread, and a couple of middle-aged men flirting with each other like they're sixteen year old teenagers.

So Rachel Berry's parents are gay, huh? She thinks to herself as the couple find every opportunity to touch each other inappropriately. On the nth attempt of the taller man to touch the smaller, darker man, Santana throws the sandwich on the table, pushes herself away from the table and mutters, "Will you guys fucking stop it with the inappropriate groping and fondling? I'm a child for god's sake. Scarred for life. _Gross._"

She doesn't notice the couple staring at her but she does notice the shocked silence that follows what she says and she looks up and Rachel's parents are staring at her in shock.

"What?" she asks.

"Rachel, sweetie, what did we say about swearing?" Tall Berry tells her.

"Uh, what did we say about swearing?" she asks cautiously.

"Well, if we swear, we put a penny in the swear jar," Short Berry says.

"_O-kay,_" Santana says now, picking up her bag and heading for the door.

"Hey, where do you think you're going?" Short Berry says.

"Uh, school?" Santana says now.

"Not without that penny in the swear jar you're not," Short Berry says.

"And a kiss for your dads," Tall Berry says.

Santana makes a face.

"Rachel, you know the rules, you swear, you have to put money in the swear jar," Short Berry.

"Fine, fine, whatever," Santana mutters, fishing out a quarter and tossing it on the big jar in the kitchen.

"Aren't you forgetting something?" Tall Berry asks.

"Uh, goodbye?" Santana says now.

Tall Berry looks at her as if she's grown an extra head, before he pulls one long finger and taps his cheek with it. Santana puts her hand on her cheek to wipe it off, thinking maybe she had some smudge on it before she turns and heads for the door.

"Hey, hey, come give us a kiss," Short Berry says now. "Or are you too old to do that?"

Santana sighs, her hands already at the door, before she turns around, quickly pecks each Berry check and bounds out the door in relief, with the Berrys reminding her not to forget about the dinner party they are having tonight for the neighbors. "Don't forget! Big show come Thanksgiving! Gotta practice those Broadway showtunes!"

_Ugh_, Santana thinks. Swear jars? Vegan food? Kisses on the cheek? Dinner parties? That pink bedroom? Finn Hudson posters? Thanksgiving Broadway showtunes shows? Who fucking _does _that? Santana doesn't think she can last another minute as Rachel. She quickly looks up at the sky and says, "Alright, you've made your point, I'm sorry. Point taken, it's hard being a geek. Can you give me back my penis and my life now please?"But the sky is just a cloudy, gloomy gray as she walks down the street in Rachel's jeans, shirt and jacket. Of course, because now she's Rachel Fucking Berry she has to get to the bus stop and sit at the fucking back, instead of waiting for Quinn to pick her up, or driving to Quinn's house to pick her up.

To top it all off, she'd spent the whole morning rummaging through Rachel's drawer before she finds something nice that she could actually wear amidst the animal print knit sweaters, tube socks, baby doll shoes, headbands, skirts that made Rachel Berry look like a homeschooled overgrown kindergarten special ed girl. It was yet another thing she knows she won't be able to stand: Rachel Berry's stupid, dork-y, geeky wardrobe that pretty much invited anyone to throw a slushie on her every day for the rest of her life.

Which is what happens the minute she gets to school. She hadn't even taken a few steps at McKinley before a slushie hits her full on the face.

Of course she throws her bag and books down and tackles the boy who had the nerve to throw the slushie at her.

She gets detention immediately afterwards.

* * *

Rachel Berry has had the worst, absolutely the worst morning, the worst _day_, ever.

And it doesn't even matter that for an autumn day it's a beautiful, albeit partly cloudy day with the light of the early autumn day shining on the beautiful changing colors of the leaves of autumn trees. What she knows is that she is having the worst day _ever_.

There was the morning wood to deal with, having to deal with an extra appendage, panic, hyperventilating, anxiety, a little crying as she went around the room, wishing she could wake up. Bad enough Finn Hudson day at the mall had been canceled due to some weather disturbances back west, and she couldn't personally meet her idol and soulmate, get his autograph and tell him Rachel Berry is his destiny, but now she has to wake up as Santana Lopez.

She'd realized that Santana's clothes could pretty much be divided into slutty or sluttier, or boring and horrible, before she finally unearths, at the back of Santana's massive closet, some long-sleeved blouses, blazer and pencil cut skirt which she promptly wears with the baby doll shoes that Santana has stashed at the back of the closet, along with some ribbons and headbands.

There was also the fact that there was no available food in the fridge but bacon, eggs, burritos and non-vegan bread, which were all super gross and horrid. There'd been a note from Santana's mother, tucked on the fridge, thus, "Santana, I'll be home late, there's some leftover in the fridge and some microwave dinner, you can have Quinn or Brittany come over, but they can't stay over okay? It's a school night. Don't forget to do your homework and lock up after, okay? PS Take care and please stay out of trouble, okay? Try not to get into detention today. I'll see you tonight."

* * *

So Rachel wasn't prepared for what being Santana Lopez entailed.

This started the moment she steps out of the house and finds a gorgeous blonde girl in a nice car waiting for her outside.

She isn't prepared for when she walks down the paved walkway, ignoring how good the day was and the girl turns and there's this slow, wide smile that spreads all over the girl's face, coupled with a delighted look as she approaches, a look that changes into confusion when Rachel passes by the car and starts to walk down the street, deep in her own thoughts. Rachel is thinking about how this had happened, about how she needs to find Santana to figure out how to get to her own body, because seriously the whole morning had been a nightmare – with her having to manhandle an erect penis, and trying and failing to aim said offending penis into the toilet bowl, so that the whole wall of the bathroom, her pants, her hands and part of her face is covered in pee, and then having to wear something that would hide the appendage and thus avoid detection and possible beating up by the McKinley student body, and then having to keep down the panic and fear and anxiety and overall nervous breakdown that such a situation would inevitably engender. She looks up at the sky and says, "You win, okay? You win. I'm sorry. This is hard, I should have been nicer, please give me my body back" and alternating with, "I must be dreaming, I'll wake up soon" and pinching her arm in the process.

She is so lost in her thoughts that she doesn't realize the car following her and the blonde girl shouting for her until there's a loud car horn coupled with "Santana!" and she turns and it's Quinn Fabray, come to pick Santana Lopez up, and she turns, resumes walking, before she realizes, _she's_ Santana Lopez, and she stands there, debating what to do, but Quinn had already stopped the car, opened the passenger door, smiled up at her, and said, "Get in, loser."

Rachel's face falls at Quinn's statement, but as soon as she slides into the seat and buckles up, nervous and anxious, and Quinn starts the car and drives down the street, Quinn's right hand finds Rachel's hand and twines her hand with Rachel's and it takes a while before Rachel realizes what is happening, but then she glances at Quinn and Quinn has this nice, affectionate smile on her face for Santana and Quinn smells nice and looks really beautiful and it all clicks into place: Santana and Quinn are dating. _Oh my god_, she thinks, Santana and Quinn, popular head bitches of McKinley High and popular for having dated the most of the popular boys at school, are _dating, _she thinks. But since she is now Santana Lopez, that meant she is dating Quinn Fabray, which is some weird screwed up thing that she can't even wrap her head around, which meant Rachel Berry, resident Lima loser, is now by extension dating Quinn Fabray, too. This opens up a whole new can of worms for Rachel Berry, such as, does Quinn Fabray know about Santana's extra appendage? Have they been..._intimate_? Will this mean getting naked in front of Quinn Fabray? The thought of doing so, or doing any other couple-related things with Quinn Fabray confuses and starts to fill Rachel Berry with anxiety. It is too much to process for one morning, to be honest. She quickly pulls her hand away from Quinn Fabray, to Quinn Fabray's confused, questioning look.

There is silence in the car now, a silence that is filled by some pop music that Quinn Fabray is busily humming, too. Rachel tentatively leans over, but looks to Quinn for permission. Quinn nods, waves her hand and says, "Sure, go ahead" and Rachel happily changes the radio station to one she likes and the first strains of "The Sound of Music" start to play.

Quinn is so surprised she almost slams the car into the car in front of them at the traffic light. There is silence in the car as Rachel enjoys the music and Quinn looks at her with a puzzled look on her face.

"Santana, since when do you like Julie Andrews?" Quinn asks Rachel carefully as the light turns green and she guns the engine down the street.

Rachel beams at her and says. "Since forever!" she says excitedly. "Sound of Music is awesome."

Quinn makes a face, knitting her eyebrows in confusion and disgust, saying nothing as she makes her way to McKinley.

After a few seconds, Quinn clears her throat and says, above Rachel singing along to the song, "Santana, as much as it's...horrifying to find out this side of you, I think it's important for our friendship that you change stations..."

Rachel nods and changes stations and stops at a station that is playing Abba's "Mama Mia!"

She starts to sing along to the song and before she gets to the chorus, Quinn reaches over, changes stations and says, to Rachel's loud protests, "I've said it before, and I'll say it again...No more _fucking_ Abba!"

When Rachel hears the Bee Gees' song, "More than a Woman" playing, she shouts, "Hey! This one! I like this one!"

"No!" Quinn vehemently says, still fiddling with the buttons.

Then Rachel hears Finn Hudson's voice singing a cover of "You're Having My Baby" and she insists on listening to the song and Quinn has a fit and they spend the rest of the trip to McKinley High arguing over Rachel's now suddenly questionable song choices.

When they get to school and the whole of the student body part for Santana Lopez (now Rachel Berry) and Quinn Fabray, Rachel is surprised and open-mouthed, awed, to say the least. Rachel is definitely not prepared for when big football, hockey, basketball and lacrosse jocks, two or three times the size of Santana cower in fear and offer to carry her bag, her books, or bring her food during break time. Rachel also magically seems to have acquired best friends in the form of Noah Puckerman who puts his arm around her when he sees her, and says, "Sup, Santana?" to which she smiles, slowly pushes his arm away from her and says, "Hey, Noah."

Puck stops, takes a step back and stares at Rachel, before he says, "Who are you and what have you done to my best friend?"

Rachel's heart start to race. "What?"

Puck only looks at her, searching her eyes, as if curious, as he says, "You never call me Noah. _Ever_. Like ever, _ever_. "

"Um..." Rachel says now, storing that information in her head, along with Quinn's hatred of Broadway, Abba, Bee Gees and Finn Hudson away in her head, desperately looking for an excuse. "There's a first time for everything?"

Puck considers this for a moment before he shrugs and says, "Okay. Whatever. Later, dude!"

* * *

And Rachel isn't prepared for when students in the classes stop and look at them in awed silence as they make their way to their desks at the back of the room, and everyone scrambles to help them with homework or offer to make their homework or offer to give them notes for the classes they've missed.

But then, the spell is broken when a random jock, with a bad mullet, a varsity shirt and a hockey stick passes by and shouts, "Dyke!" at her to the loud guffaws of the other jocks, only to be followed by someone larger than bad mullet guy, a football jock whose name Rachel thinks is Karofsky, shoving him against the lockers.

"Watch it faggot!" bad mullet guy shouts and this prompts Karofsky to go back and push him harder against the lockers.

A few other jocks come to them and try to break off the fight before the bell rings.

It's not the first time Rachel gets called "dyke" that day and for the rest of the time that she is Santana.

* * *

Before they go to their first class, Quinn pulls Rachel into the supply closet before first bell and tries to kiss Rachel and Rachel's screws up her nose at the dank, mildewed, weird smell of the closet and quickly averts her face away from Quinn's lips and says, "Mouth sore, inside the lips, very painful..."

When Quinn only looks at her in the half-darkness, impatient and irritated, making to kiss her again, Rachel quickly says, "And also gingivitis and maybe tonsillitis and...a sore throat..."

Quinn leans back, puts her arms in front of her and says, "Are you fucking _kidding_ me Santana?"

Rachel flinches at the nth time Quinn cusses, unused to this kind of conversations, shakes her head vigorously, heart pounding furiously. She hadn't really actually kissed anyone before. She was kind of hoping her first kiss would be with someone _other _than Quinn Fabray.

Quinn is unaware of her train of thought however, staring at her in silence until Rachel averts her gaze, and Quinn says, "Is this about the other day?"

Rachel looks at her in confusion.

"Because I wouldn't let you go to third fucking base or something?"

_Gross,_ Rachel thinks. Santana Lopez, you're giving me way too much to process here. Rachel though shakes her head outwardly.

Quinn only grins in a flirty, shy way as she says, in a low voice, "Because didn't we decide to wait? Until prom night at least? You know I'm not yet ready..."

_Ready for what?!_ Rachel thinks, panicked. _Oh,god, _she thinks. Is she going to lose her virginity to Quinn Fabray? Because she hadn't planned on becoming a man...woman...whatever on prom night...or any night for that matter.

Quinn sighs now and says, "Fine, whatever. You can touch my boobs if you like." She leans over, plants a soft kiss on Rachel's cheek and whispers, in a low voice, "Tonight, my place." Before she leaves, she looks down at Rachel's groin, smirks and says, "You might want to take care of that, San."

When Quinn leaves as the bell rings, Rachel is left standing in the middle of the closet, staring at her, the feel and taste of Quinn's lips on her lingering and an uncomfortable, tight feeling in her crotch. She looks down and sees that that thing between her legs, Santana's penis, is hard. Rachel grimaces. _Gross_.

* * *

So being slushied before first bell isn't actually the worst thing that's happened to Santana, although not being called "dyke" for once in her life seems like a step-up. If she is to survive being Rachel Berry whilst she is looking for the other girl and the body that is clearly Santana's and looking for a solution, she figures out that she must survive as Rachel Berry first and pull off being her. It is harder than it looks, especially since the namecalling changes.

The namecalling has been quickly replaced by Rick "The Stick" and Azimio calling her "geek", "loser", "freak" and "dork". This also means having no friends, being the last person to be picked in gym for volleyball, sitting at the back, during classes, having no friends – well, friends that she would be interested in really, as Kurt, boyfriend Blaine, Sam, Mike and Artie come to say hi to her, then immediately try to protect her from the slushie aimed at her, which ended in the fight that had her going to detention.

Sam, Mike, Artie, Kurt and boyfriend Blaine all surround her and chat with her and fight to have her be their lab partner, and chat with her about music and dancing and she finds out Kurt is playing Kurt Von Trapp for "The Sound of Music" and Mike is playing Rolf and his girlfriend Tina is playing Liesel Von Trapp, Sam is playing Friedrich Von Trapp and she, Santana, or rather Rachel, is playing Maria. Right in the middle of the hallway, everyone starts harmonizing, to Santana's harassment. Santana realizes why they are social outcasts and labeled dorks and are single. Except for Mike. And even Mike's relationship, based on his argument the other day with Tina Cohen-Chang seems to hang in the balance as well. Blaine definitely is screaming for a make-over, she notes and Kurt needs to fucking stop with the gushing about Finn Hudson and how his mall tour has been rescheduled and she and Kurt can go to the mall soon. Not even they're involvement in the sports programs of the school has made them as popular as Santana Lopez.

"I don't understand though, aren't the Von Trapps like the whitest, straightest, most Teutonic family in the history of the world?" Santana asks and everyone looks at her as if she's committed a heinous crime.

It would seem that pulling off being Rachel Berry is harder than it looks.

* * *

Rachel is prepared to spend the rest of the morning looking for Santana Lopez and figuring out how to get out of this mess. But she barely has time to think, much less process the idea that Santana Lopez and Quinn Fabray are dating, and know each other, in the biblical sense, and that she may, in fact, be about to become a man, when, on her way to her class, Rachel _Berry's_ class, she is pulled away from the hallway and into yet another closet that smells of bleach and soap and other assorted smells.

"What...?" she begins to say, but a hand clamps her mouth shut and an iron-like grip is on her arm and an angry pair of eyes are staring down at her.

"What the fuck did you do?" Santana asks now between gritted teeth.

She looks at Santana, afraid and confused, shaking her head in confusion and fear, whatever noise she is making muffled by Santana's hand. Santana is close, so close she can smell this fragrant smell of sunshine and autumn, flowers and grass and for a moment she is lost in Santana's scent before she realizes Santana is glaring at her. Santana, realizing she's had Rachel's mouth covered, takes her hand off, leans back and just stares at Rachel.

"What are you talking about?" Rachel sputters out now.

"What the fuck you mean what are you talking about?!" Santana demands now. "This!" Santana says, pointing at her body, in front of her, now inhabited by Rachel, before saying, "And this!" pointing at Rachel's body, where she is currently trapped in. "You did this, you hobbit. You did some kind voodoo bullshit spell whatever and now I have your stupid nose and your stupid, fugly face and your parents and your fucking _life!_"

"I didn't do anything!" Rachel says now. "I'm as much in the dark about this as you are!"

Santana leans over now, voice low and threatening, "You're lying."

"No, no, I'm not, I swear."

"You must be fucking lying. Because if you're telling the truth, we wouldn't be here."

Rachel shakes her head in panic. "I didn't do anything, I swear..."

"You're _lying!_"

Rachel is still shaking her head and her heart is beating so fast inside her chest as Santana's voice escalates to such a loud one and Rachel finds herself shouting back, "I'm not! I woke up just as confused as you were! I don't know what happened! I went to bed a girl and I woke up in your body! With a small penis, or possibly a large clitoris, and I had to deal with a morning erection and eating bacon and eggs and finding out I, you, have a frisky girlfriend who wants to get lucky on prom night and I am so not interested in becoming a man on prom night or on any night for that matter!"

"You are so not fucking sleeping with Quinn!" Santana threatens her now.

"I wouldn't touch her with a ten-foot pole!" Rachel shouts back, hysterical now. "I've had like the worst morning ever and on top of that, Finn Hudson canceled and he's like the best thing that's ever happened since tofu burgers and yesterday I went to bed a virgin, and today I woke up and..."

"Say it," Santana says now, more a challenge and a threat than anything. "You woke up a fucking freak? A fucking monster? A fucking weirdo?"

"I...didn't say that," Rachel says now, feeling on the verge of tears. "Look, I didn't ask for this okay? It might surprise you to know, Santana, that I actually enjoy my life prior to this switcheroo and that I actually had a life before this and I'm supposed to get a scholarship to this school I've dying to go to and I've got auditions and an interview coming up, and it's so hard to get in and they only ever let only a few students get in every year and I've Show Choir nationals, and it's my last year so I want to win and I've got State Math Olympics and State Physics Olympics and we've got that Science Fair coming up and I've got debate team and Math Club and Foreign Languages Club and Classical Music Club and Science Club and that superhero club Sam and Blaine wanted me to join and AV Club and I'm singing lead on "The Sound of Music" and I waited four years to be the lead and I worked very hard on that play and I'm pretty sure I'm going to be a better Maria than Carrie Underwood because she really sucked as Maria and she can't act if her life depended on it and..."

"You're rambling," Santana interrupts impatiently. "And my god you're such a nerd. You spend way too much time in after school programs. Don't you have a life?"

"I'm sorry," Rachel says now. "It's just..." and here the lump in her throat grows so big she can't say anything and she finds herself crying.

Santana stares at her, first in surprise, then in annoyance and impatience before she says, "What the fuck, Berry? Cut it out."

But Rachel doesn't stop sobbing and Santana says, "Alright, alright, I'm sorry. Please don't cry. I've just had, like, the fucking worst morning ever. I woke up in your fucking room, which, what the fuck, man? What's up with all the pink stuff? I thought I died and went to pink heaven or something! And you're weird obsession with Finn Hudson is bordering on the creepy. You need a love life. And I had to eat vegan food and put a quarter into the swear jar and I suddenly don't have a love life or a social life for that matter and..." Santana stops and says, "Oh, yeah, I don't have my dick anymore. And it's not about the size, you jerk. It's how you use it."

Rachel nods, but starts to sob even more.

"Alright, alright, I'm sorry. I'm just a bit sensitive about that," Santana mutters. "Calm down, stop crying. We need to figure this out, so we can go back to how things were, okay? It's going to be okay." She looks at Rachel now. "It's so weird looking at you and seeing me."

Rachel nods. "Yes."

"Alright, it's going to be fine. We just need to figure out what happened yesterday," Santana says. "Okay, think, what were you doing yesterday that you weren't normally doing before that you think may have contributed to this?" Santana asks. "Other than being a dork and a geek or something?"

Rachel rolls her eyes. She mentally goes over the events of the past day – what had been different yesterday? How come they switched bodies?

"Well, yesterday was Halloween," Rachel offers, uncertainly. "_Samhain,_ and you know how they say strange supernatural things happen on Halloween and..." Rachel thinks hard. "There was...that fortune cookie Mike Chang gave us..."

Santana nods, encouraging Rachel to continue. "And there was that earring...and..." Rachel stops, thinks and remembers something. "And you and Tina exchanging Harry Potter spells and stuff...And then we kind of started arguing about not having any idea what the other person's life was, and then...we went home and there was some thunder and lightning and..."

"We switched bodies?" Santana supplies.

"Yes!" Rachel says now.

After much argument in which Rachel convinces Santana to keep all their bases covered, they spend the rest of the day interviewing Mike Chang and Tina Cohen-Chang, before they meet at the bleachers and discuss their next move.

As they sit on the bleachers, Rachel says, "Okay...so...what if we're just dreaming and this is just a bad dream and we just need to be woken up?"

Santana nods vigorously. "Yes! Maybe we could..."

"Pinch each other?"

"Or slap each other or something?"

"That's a good idea," Rachel says now. "I..."

Without a word, Santana slaps her now.

"What on earth was that for?!" Rachel demands now.

"I'm _slapping_ you!" Santana says. "You suggested that would help us get back to our bodies..."

"Well, you could've warned me or some..."

Santana's hand comes out again and she slaps Rachel's face so hard her face whips back and there's red welt on her cheek.

"Will you stop that!" Rachel says now. "I..."

Santana slaps her again and Rachel is so annoyed she slaps her back and they end up slapping each other but after a few minutes though, they're still not back in each other's bodies and both their cheeks are red and Rachel is rubbing her cheek and Rachel is saying, "This is not working..."

"Thanks for the info, genius," Santana says sarcastically.

"Well, now that you mention it, I may have an IQ of..."

Santana quickly cuts her off with a, "I don't care" and continues with, "What if we kind of...run into each other as fast as we can and maybe that can kind of...jolt us back into each other or something...? So you go that way and I go this way and we slam ourselves into each other and..."

"Let me get this straight...I go this way and you go that way and we run into each other?" Rachel says now. "That's disingenuous."

Santana rolls her eyes. "Whatever."

Minutes later, after they stand on opposite sides of the back of the bleachers and literally run into each other as quickly and as hard as they can, they end up slamming so hard into each other that the force of the impact ends with both of them writhing on the ground, in pain and with headaches.

"That was a bad idea," Santana mutters after, rubbing her forehead as she and Rachel get up.

"Yes," Rachel nods. "And I'm still in your body and I still have your massive boobs and your...extra appendage_._.."

"Well, I have your fucking horrid, massive nose and your annoying rubber face and your small body, so yeah," Santana retorts.

"Maybe we should try it again," Rachel suggests.

The bell rings shortly after and Rachel and Santana both look towards the school building and Rachel says, "We've got to go to class now."

"Let's meet later, at the cafeteria," Santana tells her as she gets up, waves at her and leaves.

* * *

In the cafeteria, much later, Rachel says, "So...I guess, we're kind of stuck with each other."

"Oh, fuck, fuck, _fuuuuck,_" Santana says now.

Rachel patiently waits as a stream of continuous expletives in Spanish and English come out of Santana's mouth before she nods.

"So, I guess you're me and I'm you," Santana says now, sipping her coke.

Rachel nods. "Yeah, I guess so."

"Well, don't get comfortable," Santana snaps. "That's my body, and that's my life, and that's my..." here she clears her throat, stopping at using the word 'girlfriend' to describe Quinn before saying, "That's Quinn you're kissing and...you owe me a fucking shirt and jeans and fuck that slushie was totally not okay..."

"It's not like I'm enjoying this either," Rachel snaps back. "You think I liked waking up as you? With all that...stuff I had to learn? And ugh, bacon is gross."

"Well, vegan burgers are disgusting, so we're even," Santana says.

After a silence, Santana says, "What the fuck are you wearing?"

Rachel looks down. "Your clothes."

Santana screws up her face. "They look awful. Why don't you just put a sign that says, 'Kick Me' and get it over with?"

"They are nice clothes, Santana, and may I say that people actually liked this outfit on me."

Santana rolls her eyes. "That's because I'm popular, you idiot. I could wear a cast or a paper bag on my head and make it a fashion statement and everyone would dig it."

As Rachel takes this in, and the next bell rings, Santana says, "We need to talk. Later, at the bleachers, after class."

As they take their seats on the bleachers, watching other students practice or run or do gym class, Rachel says, uncertainly, "So, um..." she pauses, there is a silence again, before Rachel says, "What do we do now?"

Santana shrugs. "I don't know. We need to figure out what do, Berry, because I've got Cheerios Nationals, Coach Sue will kill me if I don't show up, and I can't show up as you, and you can't show up as me, because fuck, that's such a fucked up scenario I don't even want to imagine, and I've got to deal with Quinn and Brittany and unlike you, Berry, I've actually got a life."

"Well, I'm not enjoying this either, Santana, I've got auditions and an interview coming up, and Show Choir nationals, and that Math Olympiad and Sound of Music..."

"Sound of Music?"

"That musical we're performing for Christmas," Rachel explains.

Santana rolls her eyes. "Nerd. Why can't you be a normal person like everybody else? I mean, I saw you yesterday at that statue whatever taking down notes and god, you need a social life, Berry, or you'll definitely die a virgin..."

"Okay, so this is going to be hard, but I think we can totally pull this off," Rachel says. "We don't know how long this is going to last, but I'm an actress, and you can pull it off, just need to be me for a few days, and I just need to be you for a few days. You just need to teach me stuff that you do and I just need to teach you things, too."

"Right, right," Santana says now. "I've got Cheerios practice later, and well...Quinn...and I'm hanging out with Brittany and stuff..."

Rachel nods. "And I've got that part-time job at Lima Bean, and Glee Club and Math and "Sound of Music" rehearsal."

"Okay," Santana thinks now, already thinking this is going to be bad.

"Yes, so I'll just teach you the choreography and arrangement and lyrics of the song we're doing for Regionals and Nationals and what you're supposed to do for the Math Olympiad, and the songs and blocking and lines for 'The Sound of Music' and stuff!" Rachel says excitedly. "And you have to tell me how to deal with Quinn, too."

"You're still not sleeping with Quinn, Berry," Santana reminds her now.

Rachel rolls her eyes. "I didn't say I was."

* * *

Rachel is busy telling her about the Glee Club rehearsals as Rachel prepares for Cheerios practice and Santana is telling her about Cheerios and how important it is to do warm-up exercises and doing cardio and Rachel tells her the importance of vocalizing when Santana stops and says, "Oh, _fuck_."

"Santana, if you're going to be me, you have to stop swearing like some kid from the wrong side of the tracks or something," Rachel says now.

"Well, I have detention later, so I can't probably attend your Glee Club rehearsal and...you're theater rehearsal," Santana carefully says now.

Rachel stops, and stares at her. "You what?!"

"I've...got detention later.."

"Santana," Rachel says in a warning tone. "I'm aiming for a 4.0 GPA and a clean permanent record and..."

"Newsflash, hobbit, nobody cares about your permanent record," Santana says now in a bored tone.

"Yes, well, I'm sure you don't, because the only job you'll probably have is working on a pole, stuck in some kind of sham of a marriage, but some of us actually want to make something of our lives okay?" Rachel says now.

It is too late before Rachel realizes what she's said. When she does realize it, she looks afraid, like she's just made some unforgivable thing. And she closes her eyes, waiting for Santana to slap her, but Santana is speechless, looks like she has been slapped, and she looks at Rachel with surprise, shock, and as Rachel looks closely, hurt. Rachel feels immediately sorry and guilty.

"I'm...I'm sorry...I didn't mean that..." Rachel says now, deeply ashamed.

Santana just looks at her, not knowing what to say.

"It's totally not what I meant to say..." Rachel continues now.

Santana is silent for a moment, before she simply says, "You meant exactly what you said."

Santana then slowly gets up and leaves Rachel. She doesn't hear from again until classes end.

* * *

Rachel is distracted as she stumbles and fumbles and struggles through the Cheerios' routines in Santana's tight pants and top, jumping up and down and vainly doing cartwheels and backflips and screaming her lungs out and waving her pom-poms around shouting, "Give me an 'M'! Give me a 'C'! Give me an 'K'!..." and shaking her hips and her ass and slipping and sliding and sweating as Coach Sue screamed into her bullhorn thus, "That was terrible!" and "You think that's hard? Try a triple bypass surgery, that's hard!" and other verbal abuses that Rachel had never heard from any other teacher, even Mr. Schuester. It occurs to her that this is probably the reason why the Cheerios have consistently won Nationals and enjoy endorsements, scholarships and popularity.

"Lopez!" Coach Sue screams into her bullhorn. "My grandmother's bowels have better moves than you! What the hell's the matter with you today?"

Before Rachel could come up with an answer, Quinn immediately comes to her rescue, saying, "Um, sorry, Coach Sue, Santana hasn't been...feeling well..."

Rachel tries not to smirk as she thinks to herself, Quinn Fabray, standing by her "_man"_. Who'd have thought head bitch would protect her...whatever it is she calls Santana? It's a whole new side to Quinn Fabray Rachel hasn't seen before.

Coach Sue snorts and says, "That's not an excuse! Unless your dying or dead, I expect you to bring your A-game everyday or you get cut!"

"Sorry, Coach, she'll do better," Quinn says in between the routines, finding a way to glare at Rachel in the meantime.

Rachel makes to smile to show her gratitude, but she misses her footing and slips on the grass instead.

It is not the first time she slips. She slips as she climbs on the back of one of the other cheerleaders during one routine where she is required to climb the pyramid. One of the others almost miss catching her and so she half-lands on somebody else, and she lands incorrectly on her ankle and almost sprains her wrist doing a handstand, so much so that by the end of practice, she is limping away from the field like she's survived a war and when Brittany and Quinn bound up to her, still all intact and energetic and excited and very touchy-feely, it is all she can do to blow up on them. Quinn is excited and wants to invite herself to Rachel's – well, Santana's place, but Rachel says, "I'm...kind of tired today, Quinn, sorry. Can I take a rain check though?"

Quinn's face drops in disappointment, and Rachel immediately feels something akin to sadness, and finding a way to make Quinn feel better, but then stopping herself at the last minute, realizing she's beginning to act like Quinn is an actual girlfriend, rather than the girl who just happened to come with the body and the penis that she found herself trapped in this morning. Still, Santana would probably kill her if she didn't at least make an effort about it, so she kind of limps to Quinn and says, softly, "I'll make it up to you, okay? I'm really sorry."

Quinn nods and looks at her, before she says, "You need help getting home or something?"

Rachel shakes her head. "No, I'll be fine..."

"Cause we have that celibacy club meeting today, San... and you have yet to sign your abstinence pledge..."

"Oh."

"But it's not a big deal," Quinn says now. "You should go home and get some rest and I'll just call you later?"

Rachel nods. "Although, seriously, I don't understand why we need to have abstinence pledges and stuff," Rachel says. "I mean, girls want it as much as guys do."

Quinn stops, stares at her, eyebrows knitting. Rachel swallows, not wanting Quinn's famous temper to blow up on her, but Quinn just smiles and says, "Yeah, you're right about that."

As Rachel exhales a sigh of relief, Quinn says, voice suddenly low, "I know I want it with you, San, as much as the next girl."

Rachel feels herself blush as Quinn smiles and Rachel feels uncomfortable again. Quinn waves to her as she turns around and jogs to the showers.

Brittany hangs back, matches Rachel's pace as she limps to the showers herself, but as they near the bleachers, Brittany pulls at Rachel's hand, and they duck under the bleachers.

"Hey, San," Brittany says now, hands holding Rachel's, eyes soft and searching. "How are you?"

"I'm fine," Rachel says. "I've gotta go, I've got to take a shower..."

"Are you mad at me, San?" Brittany suddenly blurts out.

"What? Mad? Why?" Rachel asks.

"Because...I didn't want to sleep with you anymore and I wanted to talk about our feelings and stuff and we were supposed to meet Miss Holiday today," Brittany explains. "And 'cause you're my bestest best friend in the world, Santana, and I didn't want to lose you just 'cause we decided to fool around a bit behind Quinn's back and it was okay before when you guys weren't together yet but now it isn't, and you said you and Quinn aren't serious anyway but..."

Rachel stops, not knowing what to say, realizing what Brittany has just said. Oh, my god, Santana is sleeping with _both_ of them?

"Anyway, we're supposed to meet Miss Holiday today," Brittany says softly. "I hope you didn't forget."

"Er, no," Rachel says now. "But, er, I have a prior appointment and I have some stuff to do," she ends lamely, knowing as she says it that it is the lamest excuse she's ever come up with in the history of lame excuses she's ever come up with.

She knows it is immediately lame because Brittany's face falls and there's this disappointment on her face that Rachel realizes she couldn't bear to see.

"But...maybe next time?" Rachel says hesitantly now. "I mean...we can still meet her right?"

Brittany nods.

"And maybe we can go to Breadstix or something later?" Rachel offers.

Brittany's face brightens at that and she nods vigorously, making Rachel smile.

"Good," Rachel says now. "I'll see you later?"

Rachel nods.

Then Brittany suddenly hugs her. "Thanks, San. I'm so relieved. Normally you kind of blow up on me or clam up but you've taken this stuff pretty well. I'm so happy. You know I care for you, Santana. See you later?" Brittany says, before giving her hand a squeeze, waving goodbye to her and leaving.

Oh, _crap_, Rachel says.

* * *

Santana thinks she's been spared "Sound of Music" and Glee Club rehearsals, but for some strange reason, Kurt, Sam and Mike sneak in to get her out, so they can practice for Glee Club, which annoyed Santana to no end.

They were practicing some "mash-up" of "Earth, Wind and Fire" and "Le Freak" or something, Santana wasn't too sure, and she had to follow the lame ass choreography, with Kurt leading, as Mr. Schuester was currently indisposed, but as she got into it, she realized, she realized it was just like cheerleading, except with a lot of singing and harmonizing. In the middle of one botched choreography, she announces, "This sucks! We suck! We need new choreography!" and the others seem to agree and by the end of the day, she ends up convincing everyone to sing a mash-up of "Push It" and "Let's Talk About Sex" and "I Wanna Sex You Up" for their school assembly.

"Sound of Music" was a bit more annoying, as its sole requirement seemed to be being perky and happy and being able to skip around the stage exuding complete and utter sappiness singing about the hills being alive with the sound of music and one's favorite things.

It totally sucked.

Santana realizes, by the nth time she screws up the singing and the blocking for the play, that she has to find a way to get back to her body.

She needed to talk to Berry.

Except she'd just walked out on Berry.

She sighs.

Fuck this situation is forcing her to be fucking nice to the current occupant of her hot, spanking body.

* * *

Rachel is sore all over.

Rachel is sore and in pain and hungry as she limps home and she is excitedly thinking about the hot bath she will have and the bed and the blanket and the sheets with the high threadcount on her bed, but then she realizes she doesn't have a ride and she can't drive so she limps her way to the bus stop with her bag on one hand and some books on the other.

She is limping down the sidewalk, shivering as an autumn breeze blows around her, when she sees Santana walking towards her. She stops, not sure what to do, but Santana gives her a small smile and she attempts to smile back.

"Hey," Santana says, as she comes up to her. "Enjoying my life, I presume?"

"Hey," Rachel says weakly, attempting to smile. "And no, not really." Rachel says, "Look, I'm sorry. About before. I was a jerk. I shouldn't have said that. I don't even know you and..."

"It's fine," Santana says now. "Where you going?" Santana says now, voice hoarse.

"Work."

"Work?" Santana asks.

"Lima Bean," Rachel explains. "I work part-time twice a week."

Santana says, "You're probably in no condition to work there now. Aside from the fact that...tiny, insignificant detail of you being me."

Rachel's face falls, realizing she's right. "I guess that means I'll have to quit or something."

"Yes, I guess so," Santana says indifferently now. Totally not her problem so whatever.

"Why is your voice hoarse?" Rachel suddenly asks.

"Why are you limping?"

"Cheerleading practice."

"Glee practice."

"Ah."

As Rachel shifts the books and the bags on her shoulder so she could be more comfortable, Santana says, "Here, lemme get that for you."

"Thanks," Rachel mutters.

"Where you going?"

"Home."

"Home meaning?"

"Home meaning my two gay dads, what do you think?" Rachel says.

Santana looks at her with a funny look on her face. "Yeah, sure, they'll be very thrilled to find out that the Jewish daughter they had yesterday is now some Latina with..." She waits to let this sink into Rachel before she says, "Look, you do know you can't go home looking like me right? And I sure as hell can't go home as you, so what say you go home to my house and pretend to be me for a little bit and I go home to your house and pretend to be you for a while..." when Rachel makes to protest, Santana quickly adds, "Just until we get switched back again, okay?"

"But...can't I...kind of just...wear a wig or a mask or something to pass myself off as...myself?" Rachel asks now, the thought of being away from her gay dads for even a night already making her feel anxious and stressed and depressed. She could already feel the tears pool in her eyes.

Santana sighs, bracing herself for the waterworks. Rachel is perhaps the biggest drama queen she's ever met. She wants to tell her it's only for the night, and that she, Santana Lopez, has had to live in a single-parent household since her parents divorced, and that she rarely sees her mother, or any of her relatives really. But she really doesn't want to give Rachel any reason to start crying publicly, so she says, "Look, you can come over if you want, okay? Have dinner with us or something...I'm sure your parents won't mind...You can hang out in your room and have dinner with us and then I drive you back..."

"I don't drive," Rachel says, trying hard not to sniffle.

"Whatever, I'll make sure you're home safe," Santana says impatiently. When she looks at Rachel and she sees Rachel's upper lip quiver, Santana softens and says, gently, "We're going to get through this, okay? We're going to get our bodies back and you can go...sing Broadway show tunes to your heart's content or whatever, okay? But in the meantime, it seems like we're going to be stuck with each other for a little while,so just...hang in there...we'll figure something out and everything's going to be right as rain again, okay? Besides, we need to talk about how to pull off being each other, so."

* * *

So Santana and Rachel go home to Rachel's house. Thankfully, the Berry fathers are still at work, so they have the house to themselves.

Santana prepares Rachel a hot bath, and some cold compress and some bandage for her wrists and ankle and as Rachel soaks in the bath, enjoying the warmth coursing through her body, Santana coaches her through the bathroom door, telling her tips on how to deal with Coach Sue, Quinn, Brittany, the Cheerios, Cheerio Nationals, techniques on how to land without hurting herself, how to balance herself on the pyramid, how to shout without getting herself hoarse, the proper breathing technique, what to eat, what not to eat, what exercise regimen she should adhere to, what she should wear, even where Santana stores her compression shorts so Rachel doesn't have to deal with anything poking through the crotch of her jeans. Some of it is familiar to Rachel, some of it is not, but she hardly interrupts Santana. For some strange reason, Santana's voice seems soothing somehow, calming even, and she lets her talk long after she's done taking her bath.

Downstairs, whilst Rachel is preparing dinner – she sometimes prepares dinner when her parents aren't home, Rachel tells her about Glee Club, Math Olympiad, being president of the PFLAG, being member of the Honors Society, being the lead in the school play, having been accepted to all the colleges and universities of her choice, being excited about her interview and the performance she's supposed to present after her interview, Finn Hudson, her friends and how music is life.

"I've been performing since I was three, when my parents gave me my first tap dancing shoes and I performed for my fathers' friends..." Rachel says now. "Hearing the applause after that performance made me realize that was the only thing I wanted to do, performing and being applauded." She looks at Santana now. "I need applause to _live_."

"Oh my god, you're so weird," Santana comments now, handing the carrots to her and setting to work on the cabbage for the cole slaw Rachel is preparing. "So, like what am I supposed to be listening to or whatever when your friends or whatever are around?"

"Barbra Streisand," Rachel says, without missing a beat. "And Broadway Tunes. And Classical Music. I have a particular fondness for Les Miserables and Miss Saigon, but since I'm working on 'The Sound of Music', I've been listening to that on repeat now and I've already got my audition piece, it's 'On My Own' and 'I Dreamed a Dream' but I need to have some kind of third song, a modern piece or something, and I'm torn between a Barbra Streisand song or a Celine Dion song or..."

Santana makes a face at that now as she grabs a carrot and starts to munch on it.

"So, like, I think it's gonna be easy to pretend to be you," Santana sarcastically says now. "I'm just gonna be all like, 'Oh, look at me, I'm the center of the universe, I always need applause and validation, tell me was I just...good or extraordinary?'"

Rachel just rolls her eyes at her. "Whatever. If other people, such as yourself, for example, don't believe in me, then who's going to believe in me but myself? The only thing I have is myself, so excuse me for wanting to get out of this small town and make it big somewhere else where I won't be made fun of for my nose or face or stature or my need for applause and validation..." As Santana only rolls her eyes, Rachel says, "And I guess that's better than you and you're M.O. 'Oh, look at me, I'm all tortured and angst-y and I have all this pent-up emotion and rage I can't deal with so I'm just going to act out and throw slushies at everyone and sleep with everyone and push everyone away...'"

Santana drops the carrot she is nibbling onto a dish and says, "Okay, that's pretty low."

"You started it."

"Well, then I'm ending it," Santana says evenly now. "You don't even know me," she mutters now.

"Oh, I'm pretty sure I know at least some parts of you Santana," Rachel says now, "Starting with this thing between my legs which...I can't even..._Ugh_..."

When Santana doesn't say anything, Rachel steals a glance and Santana looks deep in thought. Rachel stops and says, "I'm sorry. Again. I'm told I have a bad case of foot-in-mouth disease..."

"You should have that checked," Santana says now.

Rachel grins. "I will."

* * *

Later, after dinner, in which the Berrys express surprise that Rachel has a friend over, and a friend who isn't a guy, and raise an eyebrow at Rachel expressing interest in hip hop and R and B even as Santana's eyes light up at the mention of Barbra Streisand, they retreat to Rachel's room before it's time for Rachel to go home.

The Berrys are surprised again when Rachel gives both of them a hug.

On their way to Santana's house, they are both quiet, not daring to disturb the peace.

Rachel manages to force Santana to stay longer than usual at home and when the Berrys call to remind her it's late, Santana finally goes home. They exchange cellphones to ensure that everyone doesn't get confused about which person to contact.

"Are you sure you're going to be okay?" Santana asks.

Rachel nods and gives her a brave smile.

* * *

Hours later, in which Santana is showered and ready to go to bed, missing her extra appendage and trying to get to sleep by watching Broadway DVDs on Rachel's player – the only kind of DVDs that seem to populate Rachel's DVD collection, and she actually successfully falls asleep right in the middle of "Hair" the movie musical when her phone, or rather, Rachel's phone, rings.

"Santana, are you awake?"

"I am now," Santana groggily mumbles, annoyed.

"What do I do if...Quinn gets frisky or something?" Rachel asks now.

Santana huffs out. "You fucking call me in the middle of the night to ask me this?"

"Sorry. Santana, your parents are still not home."

"Of course they're not home. My parents are divorced. My father is a doctor and he lives in New York. My mother is a single mom and works three jobs. Of course my parents are not home."

"Oh."

"Yeah, and the rule still applies, no sleeping with anyone's partner or whatever. There's gotta be boundaries or whatever, so. Yeah, oh, can I go back to sleep now please?"

"But..it's so quiet and empty and...scary here..."

There is a long, extended silence after this, in which Santana debates telling Rachel off with colorful expletives and insults, but realizing she needed to be nice to the girl if the girl is to take care of what is essentially Santana's body. She doesn't immediately relish what she realizes she must do.

Santana asks, "Ugh, you want me to come over?"

"Would you? Just until your mom comes back home."

"Fine, ugh. You so owe me after this, Berry."

* * *

Minutes later, Santana is sleepily knocking on her front door, in the cold, drawing Rachel's brown coat closer around the drawstring pants, shirt and sweatshirt she found among Rachel's things. A few seconds later, she hears footsteps and Rachel's beaming face smiling at her.

"Hi, Santana!" Rachel chirpily says.

"Ugh, it's midnight, aren't you like sleepy or something?" Santana mumbles as she steps into the foyer.

"I had coffee!" Rachel proudly announces.

"Well, then no more coffee for you," Santana mumbles as she heads for the couch and plops down on it. "So what do we do now?"

"Well, we could have a Netflix Broadway marathon and..."

"No."

"Or we could listen to my extensive collection of Ab..."

"No."

"You didn't even let me finish."

"I pretty much have an idea about how bad your taste is? And I'm not going to spend my weekend doing some fucking Broadway marathon or if my guess is correct, so fucking _Abba_," Santana says as she leans over, grabs the remote control, turns the television on, flicks through channels before stopping at an "America's Top Model:British Invasion" re-run.

Santana leans back, satisfied with it, tosses the remote on the coffee table, sits cross-legged on the couch and ignores Rachel as she turns her attention to the show. Rachel slowly comes to the couch, sits down, looks at the television and after a beat says, "This is a nice show."

Santana hums her agreement, barely saying anything.

"This is pretty interesting," Rachel says again. "I'm not ruling out reality show as a way to fame and..."

"Don't you ever shut up?" Santana says now.

"Sorry."

Santana sighs. "I don't know which is worse. Being stuck in your body, or being stuck with you."

"Sorry."

"Would you stop apologizing?" Santana says now. "You don't need to apologize."

"Okay, okay, sorry."

Santana only shakes her head and smiles. "You've got a lot to learn, grasshopper." After a silence, Santana says, "You know what this party needs?"

"What?" Rachel says, smiling widely.

"Booze!"

* * *

So, Santana and Rachel have finished off the wine coolers, hours later, with Rachel screaming, "It tastes like pink! It tastes like pink!" much to Santana's annoyance, they move on to drink pilfered liquor from Santana's mother's liquor cabinet and arguing over what which top model is hot.

"That British chick is awesome!" Rachel says now. "I can't believe Tyra Banks would ditch her! Actually Tyra Banks is kind of creepy..."

Santana laughs. "Take that back!" she says tipsily. "She's awesome!"

Rachel chuckles. "Yes, if you're into, like, creepy words or whatever..."

Santana grabs the remote and changes it to some movie. "Cool, Freaky Friday's on!" she says. They are silent for a while. Rachel decides it's as good a time as any to talk with her now.

"Okay," Rachel tipsily says now. "So, are you a...?"

"Girl? Boy?" Santana asks automatically, realizing from how Rachel has gone serious that she is curious about it.

"Sorry."

"My parents raised me as a boy...It's something that pissed me off to no end...I guess I still have rage issues about that until now."

"Did you ever just want to have a surgery? On it?"

"Did you ever just want to get a nose job?" Santana asks evenly.

"No, not really," Rachel says.

"So same diff," Santana says now.

"No, it's not," Rachel says. "And you got a boob job."

"Yeah, and where did that take me?"

They fall quiet again. Rachel drinks a beer before she says, "Do you love Quinn?"

"Why do you like Finn Hudson? I mean I don't get this obsession with celebrity. It's so unhealthy."

"I don't know," Rachel says. "I just feel like...he's my soulmate or something, and we're endgame and if he just..meets me, he'll know we were meant to be together and stuff."

Santana just rolls her eyes at the statement.

Rachel falls silent and then says, "And what's up with Brittany? Are you serious with either of them? Where is either of that going?"

Santana is silent before she says, evenly, "Where it is going is none of your fucking business, Berry."

They fall silent again.

"Does Quinn know?" Rachel asks now. "Like, that you're...you know..."

Santana is silent. "It's a bit..complicated..."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean...it's a bit complicated," Santana says, evasively avoiding Rachel's suddenly penetrating gaze.

"Have you done it with Quinn?" Rachel asks earnestly now.

Santana is silent for a few moments, before a blush crawls up her chest and neck and face and she says, "Shut up."

Rachel mulls this over as the realization sinks in. "Oh my god, you _haven't_? That's just..."

"What?" Santana says defensively.

"_Tragic_."

"Shut the fuck up," Santana says in irritation. When Rachel makes to say something more, Santana says, "Shut it, or I'll beat you down."

Santana leans back with her glass of vodka and eyes Rachel from the top of her glass. Rachel is silent again, her legs at the edge of the seat moving around as if they have a mind of their own.

"Does it work?" Rachel asks earnestly now, indicating Santana's penis in Rachel's crotch.

Santana scowls at her.

"Sorry," Rachel mutters now. "It's just...I was wondering if you could...make babies with...it...and stuff..."

"Do you ever shut up?" Santana asks now, drinking her vodka before grabbing the bottle and taking a swig from it. God, she so needs so much more liquor for whatever is going to go down tonight.

"Um, how do you deal with the..." Rachel begins, swallows, as Santana looks at her. "Morning wood...?"

Santana rolls her eyes now. "Well, I jerk off sometimes, but if I don't have time, I kind of just take a cold shower and that usually takes care of it."

"Oh."

Santana looks at her. "What do you mean, oh?"

"So, I guess beating it repeatedly with a rolled up newspaper in the hopes that it would go away wasn't the way to go..."

Santana stares at her incredulously. "What the _fuck_, Berry? You don't beat her with a rolled up newspaper and hope it goes away! It's not some _fucking _dog that's been bad! What the hell, Berry!"

"Sorry, sorry."

"What would you feel if I beat your nose repeatedly with a rolled up newspaper?" Santana continues. "Did you break it?"

"No!" Rachel says now.

"You sure?"

"Yes!"

"If you break my penis, Berry, I swear to god, I will break every bone in your body," Santana threatens her now.

"Alright, alright, I'm sorry."

"I mean, you could have just jacked off or taken a shower, but noooo, you have to beat it repeatedly with a fucking newspaper," Santana continues. "I mean, what the fuck is wrong with you?"

"Sorry," Rachel says sheepishly. "Won't do it again, promise." There is a pause before Rachel says, "Although you're giving me, again, too much to process here...On a normal day you wouldn't even give me the time of day...and now you want me..." and here Rachel blushes, clears her throat and says, "Touch your penis...That's kind of stepping over some boundaries, isn't it?"

Santana just glares at her. "I can't believe you ask me if it works, when you've just beat my dick repeatedly with a newspaper, I think that already tells you it actually works."

They both fall silent again, before Rachel speaks up again. Clearly the girl doesn't know how to shut up. "So, also, I'm having problems with...never mind..."

"What?"

"Just...never mind..."

"Come on, you pretty much have my dick hostage, tell me," Santana says now.

"No, it's stupid..."

"Naw, I'm sure it's not," Santana says.

"Okay, um, I'm having problems with...aiming it," Rachel says now.

"Aiming it," Santana says flatly.

"Yeah," Rachel says. "Aiming it, like when I pee and stuff..."

* * *

So Santana ends up teaching Rachel.

Rachel and Santana are in the bathroom and Santana is teaching Rachel how to aim her penis in the toilet bowl. There is pee on the toilet seat cover and on the tiles behind it and Santana is trying hard not to be annoyed as Rachel giggles, tipsy and happy for no apparent reason. Tipsy, drunk Rachel is a bit weird.

"Just..." Santana says, "Aim it inside the thing. Just, look for a target and try to hit that target..."

Rachel beams as she nods and tries to pee again.

"Dude, how much have you had to drink?" Santana asks now. "I mean, you're like some geyser or something!"

Rachel only laughs. "Yeah, I don't know. This is fun! I've never had this much fun since...forever, I think!"

Santana only rolls her eyes. "Whatever."

* * *

"See the salt on this pretzel?" Rachel asks, staring at a pretzel in her hand, whilst the other hand takes a swig at the wine cooler in her hand. They are by the window, curtains drawn aside as they stare up at the dark night sky.

"Yeah?" Santana says, blinking blearily, feeling more than tipsy now from the vodka and whiskey she's drank. It's now past midnight but against Santana's better judgment, she's actually enjoying this.

"Look at the stars. Some people say, the stars are billions and billions and tons and tons of hot gas, but I think maybe it's God's salt, and God's just waiting to eat us," Rachel says now.

Santana just stares at her. "Alright, that's it. No more booze for you."

Of course this rule doesn't work, because later, much, much later, Rachel and Santana, drunk off of Santana's mother's liquor collection, are in the living room, with the stereo on, singing along to Barry Manilow and Air Supply and singing along to a song called "Love Hurts" just because. Then they shift to Mariah Carey's "Without You" and Rachel keeps messing up the lyrics, singing, "_You almost smile, molinai, no sorrow show, no show..Ken Lee...dee bee doo bee doo bee doo... Ken Lee...Ken Lee me-joo-mooore!_" much to Santana's amusement.

"Wow, Santana, never thought I'd have the chance to hang out with you again after junior high," Rachel says now, stopping in the middle of the wrong lyrics to look at Santana and grin.

"Has it been that long?"

"Yeah, you stopped talking to me in sixth grade," Rachel tells her now, "Because I was a dork and a geek and a nerd and you were too cool for that and you wanted to sit at the popular table." She looks at Santana now. "But you were Santana Lopez, and we were in grade school and middle school together and we used to hang out and read Sweet Valley together in Sweet Valley Club and we used to watch reruns of Full House because I had a thing for John Stamos and you made me watch Charles in Charge because you had a thing for Scott Baio and there was that one time you made me watch that 'Alf' Christmas special and it was so depressing I wanted to kill myself afterwards."

"But it wasn't nearly as depressing as that Star Wars Christmas special," Santana says now. She stops and then looks at Rachel. "So, what, you were waiting six years just to tell me all that stuff? You could have at least mentioned that to me before."

"When? When you were ignoring me in the halls? When you writing, 'Rachel Berry is a tampon' on my locker freshman year?"

"I did not write 'Rachel Berry is a tampon'," Santana says now.

"Yeah, like I'm sure you didn't draw pornographic pictures of me in the girl's bathroom," Rachel says sarcastically now.

"Okay, I didn't do that either," Santana says now. When Rachel just glares at her, she says, "Okay, I maybe kinda sorta asked Quinn to do that for me..."

"Yes, and remember that time you threw out my science project for the high school science fair and I had to do a second rate version of the first one I made?" Rachel says now. "And that time you put chocolate on the seat of my pants and..."

When Rachel continues to glare at her, Santana says, "Alright, alright, I get the picture. Well, you're one to talk, you stopped talking to me because you thought I wasn't smart enough for your little geek society with your 4.0 GPAs and you always made fun of Britt and you thought Quinn was a skank...in fact, I think you also think of me as a skank..."

"I didn't..." Rachel protests now.

"Come on, if I had a dollar for every time you rolled your eyes every time Brittany said something..."

"Santana, she thinks ballads are ducks, and duets are blankets, and the capital of Ohio is 'O'," Rachel says now. "And Quinn pretty much has pretty much made out with everyone...including you..."

"Yeah, whatever, that doesn't mean you get to go around judging people," Santana says now. "What, you're better than everyone else?!"

"I am better than everyone else," Rachel says now.

Santana looks at her pointedly.

"Point taken."

"And she hasn't actually made out with everyone, or slept with everyone or slept with me or whatever," Santana says now.

"Whatever..." Rachel says now.

"Why don't you like her?" Santana asks now.

"Why are you friends with her?" Rachel asks now.

"Because, Rachel, we were friends long before we both became popular," Santana says now. "We were friends when she was still fat and no one wanted to be friends with her and I was small and dark and had frizzy hair and braces. And we're still going to be friends long after high school..."

"Oh my god!" Rachel suddenly says. "I just remembered something!"

"What?"

"The Lima Museum! That Native American statue totem whatever we were in front of and..."

"We were fighting and I wished you disappeared and you told me you didn't know what it was like to be me, and I told you you didn't know what it was like to be me and..."

"What?"

"Well, you'll just laugh at me but..."

"No, it's fine...I'm basically in your body, so..."

"Okay, so I think the eyes kind of glowed or something..." Rachel says, "I mean, there was some thunder and lightning and we were arguing and..."

"Oh, wow, how could we have missed that?! We are so going there tomorrow!"

* * *

The next day, both of them get up extra bright and early to go to the museum, and wait for hours before the museum opens.

When the museum does open, they find out that the Native American statue is gone.

"Where did it go?" Santana demands of the curator now.

"Wow, I didn't know you really dug Native American artifacts," the curator said, pushing up his glasses and running a hand on his red hair. "I mean, it's kind of cool because people say it's kind of like some kind of two-spirit..."

"Just, tell us where it went!" Santana all but shouts.

The curator, puzzled, says, "It's going on exhibit in New York...and after that, Boston, then L.A., and Washington and...some other cities...I mean...it's probably on its way to New York even as we speak..."

"Oh my god," Rachel and Santana both say now.

Both of them know what this means as they look at each other.

They will probably be stuck with each other's bodies like this for a long time.

Santana looks at Rachel and she realizes what Rachel must have realized as well as the anxiety creeps up on her.

They are both _doomed_.

Their life, as they know it, is over.

* * *

**_A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing. Just an early holiday present. Leaving reviews for this chap much appreciated._**

**_Thanks to the beta, DragonsWillFly, always for the assistance, right up to suggestions for titles. _:)**

**_Happy Holidays!_**


	3. Chapter 3

"I hate my life," Santana says as she leans on one of the lockers, watching Rachel go through her books.

She hears Rachel sigh behind her and say, "Yes, I hate my life, too."

Santana stops, waiting for Rachel to stand beside her, as Santana says, "I bet you don't hate it as much as I do."

"Oh, I'm pretty sure I hate it more than you do," Rachel murmurs.

Santana hated Mondays. Santana hated Mondays because they immediately come after the weekend and weekends are fun and do not involve school. But now she thinks she's found something far worse than Mondays to hate: being switched bodies with Rachel Berry. This has proven to be a far more stressful, bigger responsibility than both originally thought.

Rachel smiles as they both make their way to the next class. It's been weeks since they've switched bodies, but the heavens or whatever it is that has decided they should switch bodies, show no sign of giving back their actual bodies, so they have had to live as each other for a while. It is a nightmare.

They usually come to school in the same bus. Since Santana could drive, but is now stuck in Rachel's body, and Rachel can't drive and there is no extra car to drive at the Berrys to drive anyway, they'd decided to go to school together, use that extra time to talk about what Santana's extra-curricular activities are and what Rachel's activities are. Santana and the Glee Club had practiced over the weekend for their "Push It"/ "I Wanna Sex You Up"/ "Let's Talk About Sex" performance for the student assembly, whilst Rachel had gone over some of Santana's activities as well, going over the Cheerios DVDs in Santana's room that Coach Sue had every Cheerio review, all their practices, all their performances, all their competitions, from District to State to Nationals, and exercise, warm-up and cheerleading DVDs as well. Rachel had come to look at it as "immersing" herself in her character, in this case, Santana Lopez.

They'd spent that first weekend as each other agonizing over the fact that the statue has gone off on tour, and they couldn't very well just book a trip to New York or any of the other states where it is supposed to be and they have school and friends and family and the thought of having to live each other's lives had filled both of them with anxiety.

Rachel had sat on the steps in front of the Lima Museum, on the verge of tears, sniffling and blabbering about never getting out of Lima, being stuck being someone else, never ever going to drama school, never being able to go on Broadway, and ending with, "I won't even be able to do that thing where I'll work three jobs to support myself while I live in some awful, crappy apartment that's no bigger than my bedroom where it's hot in the summer and it's cold in the winter and the heating is broken and there are rats as big as my arm running around and there are blood spatters on the wall and yellow tape and chalk marks on the floor and the neighbors are always noisy and always seem to be doing it and the landlord's some creepy, fat, middle-aged balding guy with a Brooklyn accent who's always bothering me about rent while I go off on auditions and I keep getting turned down and then I get my first big break in some herpes commercial and then I start doing work playing an extra, like in some horror movie and..."

Santana had screwed up her face, knitted her eyebrows, sat down beside Rachel, who was sitting prim and proper beside her, in a nice, yellow, spring dress and a thin pink cardigan, and Santana had sat beside her, legs spread-eagled, arms resting on the knees of her jeans as she tried to think of a good way to make the other girl feel better. The wind picks up a bit and she draws her Cheerios jacket around her, feeling the cold. She'd asked Rachel to bring her the jacket, and some clothes, just to make her feel like she's still herself and not Rachel Berry with her obsession with pink clothes and animal knit sweaters and tube socks and ugly skirts. She looks up at the dark cloudy skies, the trees' branches and leaves shaking in the wind, watches a few leaves fall to the ground and cars passing them by.

The only thing she could think of is, "You think you'll get your first big break in a herpes commercial?"

Rachel looks at her, with her wide, teary-eyed, chocolate brown eyes and nods, saying, "Yes, either that or a hemorrhoid commercial...I mean studies show most of the successful actors got their start doing commercials...and maybe horror films. I'll probably start as body number one, before I go on to have speaking parts, like screaming girl number one and then I get to be shrill neighbor or friend of the female lead and then..."

"Oh, my god, stop talking," Santana says, feeling a headache come on as she rubs her forehead with her fingers. She stops and thinks for a few moments, letting the breeze blow through her hair.

When Rachel shivers, Santana instinctively puts an arm around her, rubbing her shoulder absently for a few moments, before she realizes what she is doing, springs back from Rachel's warmth, muttering "sorry" and then taking off her Cheerios jacket and putting it on Rachel's shoulder instead.

"Thanks," Rachel had said shyly.

Santana had only shrugged nonchalantly before she says, "Okay, so I guess we're stuck like this...indefinitely. So what say...we just make the most out of it..."

Rachel nods, wipes the tears from her eyes as she says, "Yes, maybe we're supposed to learn something from this, maybe it could help me prepare to be a good actor and..."

Santana gives her a withering glare, and says, "Shut up."

As they get up from off the steps of the museum, Rachel turns and smiles at Santana, pulls her Cheerios jacket closer and says, so softly Santana almost doesn't hear it, "Thank you, Santana."

Santana had stopped, not knowing what to say. There was this earnestness to how Rachel had looked at her then that she thought she almost freaked out a bit. After a pause, she says, "Well, I don't really want to be forced to wear ugly Christmas sweaters my whole life or live with your nose or whatever...so yeah..."

Rachel only looks at her, before she smiles, not even a bit offended by what Santana has said. At that exact moment, it would seem that Rachel has seen something in Santana that Santana herself hasn't noticed, because she just keeps smiling at Santana as Santana says, "What?! What are you smiling at, you weirdo?" which just makes Rachel giggle and smile some more.

So they spent that weekend, and the next weekends and all their available time, together, just talking to each other, telling each other what to do. Santana teaches and practices some basic cheerleading moves to Rachel in Rachel's backyard – so as to allow Rachel to still see her parents, albeit from afar, watching from the backyard, through the window, as her parents read books or chatted with each other, sitting in the living room or in the kitchen, just smiling and laughing with each other. Rachel flatly tells her the whole time that she finds cheerleading and the "copious amounts of shouting involved" barbaric and boring, to which Santana rolls her eyes again and says, "Studies show it's good for your health and...stuff..." Santana tells her the technique in landing so she doesn't sprain anything, tells her how to distribute her body weight equally and finding her center of gravity for balance, to which Rachel happily says, "So, it's pretty much like dancing, right? But with a lot of singing – like a musical, except you kind of encourage the Neanderthal athletes to score or something," and with that realization, Rachel just nods and seems to get what cheerleading is about and gets better at doing it, to Santana rolling her eyes. Santana even teaches her how to use the compression shorts so she can wear the Cheerios skirts and sweatsuit with ease, "Not that like you need it, it's either a small penis or a large clitoris, that can be beaten into submission, right?" Santana had said sarcastically to which Rachel rolls her eyes at. Santana teaches her how to shout so that it doesn't strain her voice, the routines for district, regionals and state championships, what their diet is ("You have a diet?" Rachel asks incredulously, to which Santana says, "Yeah, and we have to do cardio like all the freaking time, too, so yeah.") and gives her tips on how to dodge Coach Sue's abuse. "She doesn't really mean anything by it," Santana says now, "She's actually pretty nice once you get to know her, she just wants all her kids to succeed and stuff, so. No two routines are alike, it always has something big and flashy in it – and no, the rumors are _not_ true, Coach Sue did _not_ make Britt go into that canon and shoot her into the sky, or use pyrotechnics to earn points – that's just so wrong on so many levels. Although she _does_ sometimes make us wear blue wigs, walk around in stilts, toss each other around and occasionally make us slap each other with chicken cutlets..."

Rachel, for her part, teaches her the basic choreography for their Regionals performance over at Columbus, with a "We don't practice as extensively as you do and if I had it my way, I'd probably have Mr. Schuester taken out of the Glee Club, but it was either him or pervy Mr. Ryerson, so we chose the lesser evil, which in retrospect is probably bad since our set lists keep changing and we don't have a good choreographer, it's just...Mr. Schuester asking us to kind of shuffle to the left, then shuffle to the right, then kind of..toss our arms, then our legs in the air, like we're some kind of chorus girls or Las Vegas show girls and..."

"Do you raise both your arms _and_ your legs in the air? While singing? And making those faces you make? 'Cause that must be hard," Santana comments now.

Rachel had rolled her eyes at that.

Rachel'd rolled her eyes a lot that weekend, as she tried to brief Santana on the State Math Olympics, State Physics Olympics, the Science Fair project she was working on and the debate she was supposed to join, and the clubs she was either a member or president of, including National Honors Society, Math Club, Foreign Languages Club, Classical Music Club, X-Club, AV Club and the Sound of Music production they were having for McKinley.

In Santana's room, where they had hung out as well, Rachel had written this equation on a whiteboard Rachel had propped up near the bed,

12+144+20+3 . 4 ½ + 5.11= ?

7

To which, Santana says, "That's look Greek to me."

So, Rachel writes it again, indicating the answer this time

12+144+20+3 . 4 ½ + 5.11= _9(squared)__+ 0_

7

And Santana just stares at her blankly, before she says, "I'm sorry, I zoned out at..." and here she imitates Rachel's voice, "_Math is fun! It's awesome! In fact, we have a Math poetry writing contest and a Math Poetry reading after in March, during Pi Day and all the Math wizes come and_...what is up with you, Berry? I don't _do_ Math. I don't _like _Math. I think Math sucks!"

"Well, it is fun and..."

When Rachel's face drops in disappointment, Santana sighs and say, "Why...don't you teach me about your little Science club and your little science fair project instead."

"That's a great idea!" Rachel starts, grabbing the whiteboard, and writing down an equation on it, muttering, " Where 'd' equals displacement, 'a' equals acceleration, 't' equals time, 'v''f' equals final velocity and 'v''i' equals initial velocity..."

Rachel looks at Santana, smiling widely and Santana looks at her blankly, shaking her head. This does not deter Rachel though from writing down the equations for motion, Newton's Second Law, the formulas for energy, conservation of energy, periodic motion, wave speed, wave propagation, wave interference and Doppler effect.

"...So, if you to find the centripetal force, you can use this equation," Rachel says, writing the formula on the board.

"Find centipedal force? Why? Is it still lost? Why do you need to find it?" Santana jokes.

Rachel glares at her. "_Centripetal_. People mistake it for centrifugal, but whatever. Focus, Santana, focus."

As Santana blushes and mutters an apology as Rachel resumes writing other formulas on the board as she says, "...To find the velocity, you can use this equation...to find acceleration, you must use this...and to find the period one must use this equation..."

Halfway through Rachel teaching Santana about analytical, organic and inorganic chemistry chemical equations, atomic mass, nuclear fusion and fission,gravity, electromagnetism, protons and neutrons, magnetism, acoustics, soundwaves, particles and formulas for travel and velocity and displacement, electric force, electric field, potential energy, Newton's formula, Einstein's formula, Shrodinger's formula and Dirac's formula on Santana's bed, with Rachel in one of Santana's tank tops and short shorts, eyeglasses on her nose, long dark hair falling in waves on her shoulders and her face, Santana can't help but stare at Rachel's smooth, bare shoulders and arms, the slight dip between her breasts on her chest, the way her smooth thighs and legs are folded beneath her, as she spreads out papers and textbooks and notebooks on the bed, makes Santana just stare at her. When Rachel catches her staring, Santana looks away then down at the textbooks, all the words and numbers just blurring with each other, Rachel droning on and on like nothing happened, excitedly rattling off equations and facts and numbers like it was nothing and Santana has never seen this side of Rachel, how her face lights up like the Fourth of July talking about things that mattered to her, and Santana realizes just how interesting Rachel is – she's a dork and a geek sure, but right now, sitting on her bed, with Rachel, without the ugly knit sweaters and white, knee-high socks and baby doll shoes, Rachel looks almost...pretty.

Rachel stops and stares at Santana and asks, "What?"

Santana quickly shakes her head, throws her pencil down and says, "I don't know if this is worse than you trying to teach me Math..."

"Well, science actually is much more fun because it takes the theoretical with the..."

"That was rhetorical and did not require an answer," Santana had said. She stretches, yawns and says, "I'm not cut out for this shit, Berry. Are your stupid clubs more of the same?"

"Yes."

"Shit."

There is silence again, before Santana yawns, stretches, stands up, looks out at an autumn afternoon, and declares, "Okay, that's enough, I think we should take a breather, don't you think so?"

Rachel looks at her, confused, and says, "I don't understand...how is that going to enhance my college application?"

Rachel stops, considers Santana's offer, before she says, "I'm a bad teacher, aren't I?"

Santana sighs, rolls her eyes before she says, "No, you're not, okay? I just...this is just _waay_ too much to process and it's just like...in in one ear and out the other, you know?" As Rachel sits there crestfallen, teeth biting her lower lip in deep thought, Santana says, so gently it surprises her, "Look, I'm also not that interested in Science...so, yeah...the fates couldn't have picked a worse pair to switch bodies, you know? I'm sorry...I know all these stuff mean a lot to you...I'll try to do better, okay?"

Rachel thinks about this before she nods and she says, "You want listen to some music?"

Santana hesitates, whilst Rachel says, "I mean, if we're stuck with each other, we might as well know each other's likes and dislikes and stuff...Like prior to this, all I knew about you is that you were a cheerleader and you were popular and you were a bully..." Santana makes to protest but then Rachel doesn't even give her a chance to say anything in edgewise, "But since the body switch I now also know you have a penis, and you like girls..."

"I don't like girls!" Santana protests.

"Okay, okay, you like Quinn _and_ Brittany," Rachel amends and Santana wants to correct that, too, because it isn't as easy to simplify it all in that one sentence, but she just lets Rachel speak, "And you can be nice when you want to be..."

"I'm not fucking nice!" Santana says, but Rachel only laughs.

"If I had a dollar for every time you swear, Santana, I'd be rich by now," Rachel comments. Then she stops and says, "Oh, wait, there's already a swear jar in my house! If it takes a long time for us to switch back, that jar would probably be full and we'd probably need a couple more jars! Or ten!"

Santana scowls at her. "Shut the..._eff..._up!"

Rachel only giggles.

When Rachel goes over her music and offers her earphones to Santana, Santana shakes her head. Santana looks at her, not sure what to say, before she says, "I'm not really into music."

Rachel just stares at her now. "Don't be ridiculous, everyone likes music!"

Santana shakes her head. "Except me."

Rachel stops and keeps staring at her, making Santana blush, feeling even more like the freak that Rachel probably thinks she is.

"Well, why?" Rachel asks earnestly now.

"Why what?"

"Why don't you like music?" Rachel asks.

Santana rolls her eyes in answer. Why, indeed? She shrugs. It wasn't that she hated it or anything, music just seemed like a frivolous exercise in something flighty and ridiculous. Music was something she associated with people who had no care in the world, who didn't have any problems, who were shallow and desperately happy and artfully pretentious and thought what they were doing actually changed the world, when every day there were people like her father who saved lives and her mother who encouraged people to change their lives and music was just not something that mattered. In her life, music was a luxury she and her family did not indulge in.

She shrugs now and says, "No reason. It's just...it's just not something I waste time listening to."

"But everything is about rhythm and rhyme and song and feelings and stuff," Rachel says, incredulous, not believing that there's actually someone out there who is not into music. "I mean, music is awesome! I turn to music to better express myself, to deal with my feelings, to figure stuff out, I mean...granted you probably don't have perfect pitch like I do, but..."

Rachel still looks at her, puzzled and unconvinced, not saying anything. Santana thinks it would be funny, except it's not.

"Yeah, but it's just not my scene, you know?" Santana says now. When Rachel still looks at her in horror, Santana rolls her eyes. "Besides, it's not like the music you've been making me listen to is 'art' anyway," she says. "'Hair' is kind of boring, and 'Grease' is unbearable, and 'Sound of Music' is so saccharine I feel like I'd have some kind of toothache from the sweetness and 'Hairspray' is about how hairspray kind of sparks of the civil rights movement or something it's so stupid and pretty much the only one I'm interested in, in all the musicals you've forced me to listen to, is 'The Producers'..."

"Which is kind of borderline offensive because it's about making a musical about Hitler and the Jews and stuff and..."

"If you missed the part where it's actually making fun of Hitler...then you're an idiot," Santana says. "Which, I'm beginning to think you are. You're probably, like, the dumbest smart person I know..." here she stops and says, "Oh, my god, I'm arguing musicals with you...what's happening to me?!"

Santana is supposed to say something else, but Rachel's phone, which is now Santana's phone, rings and it's Sam, Kurt, Blaine and Artie calling to ask Rachel if she could hang out with them, because the X-Club is meeting at the Lima Bean and they're missing Rachel. It is Santana who answers the phone.

Rachel had already told her what X-Club was all about, which was basically a club for superhero fans, but which was basically just an excuse for its members, Rachel, Sam, Kurt, Blaine and Artie to out geek each other on anything involving superheroes, and if they ran out of superhero topics, then other geeky topics.

Santana hadn't wanted to join the club had only wanted to officially meet Rachel's friends, saying, "Well, it's a great way to see if I know much more about you now and if I can pull off being you in front of your friends, and I might as well spend time with them now, rather than later, if, as you say, we're going to be stuck together for a longer time..."

But at the end of that first time she officially met Rachel's friends as Rachel, Santana ended up joining that club, and pretty much all the other clubs Rachel was in.

It had been Rachel who discovered the idea that it would be better if Santana just joined the clubs she was in, and that Santana should just join the Cheerios as Rachel.

Santana had earlier bristled at the idea, but Rachel had rightly pointed out that they both didn't know how long they would be stuck in each other's bodies, and that at this rate, whilst they are trying to find a way to track the statue and find a way to magically force themselves in their rightful bodies, they are stuck with each other indefinitely, so Rachel says, "There's no way you can be as smart as I am overnight and there's no way I can be a cheerleader overnight, so how about you join all my clubs, including Glee, join the State Math and Physics Olympiad, the Science Fair, the debate team, I mean, I highly doubt we'll make state quals for debate, and rehearse for my interview and audition for college?"

Santana had balked. "I have to join _all _of them?!"

"Santana, if we are to continue on with our lives as if nothing..._strange_ has happened, then we have to work as a team and have some kind of a modicum of sacrifice to the cause...I mean, I'm putting up with your girlfriends, the least you could do is put up with my...extracurricular activities and... Besides, you're not joining them, I'm re-joining them, as you, so you don't need to worry about that...You, on the other hand, need to find a way to rejoin Cheerios and join Celibacy Club, 'cause there's no way I'm going to suffer through that if you're not going to be there..."

"Alright, alright, I get it," Santana says. "I hate your stupid clubs." As Rachel beams in happiness, Santana quickly adds, "I'm _so_ not enjoying any of this. I don't know whether I want to throttle you, or smother you with a pillow, Berry...that's like the most awful thing you've ever said to me, and that includes describing Santana, Jr. as either a small penis, or a large clitoris."

Rachel looks at her. "It has a name?...and while we're on the subject, you call it a her...why is that?"

Here Rachel giggles and Santana isn't supposed to find her giggle cute, but she does and she hates herself for it.

Re-joining the clubs for Rachel was fairly easy, as she already knew what joining X-Club entailed, what AV Club, Foreign Languages Club, Math and Science Club needed, as well as what preparations where needed for the Sound of Music production, not to mention what was needed for the Math Olympiad, the Science Olympiad, the Science Fair and the debate, so it was really a walk in the park for her.

For her Glee Club audition she'd sang some Amy Winehouse song, "Back to Black", which was within her range, and which was a pretty safe song choice and guaranteed to make Mr. Schuester like her right from the get-go. She normally didn't do pop songs, but she had difficulty hitting the high Broadway notes as Santana and had, predictably faltered as she tried to sing "On My Own" as Santana.

Rachel as Santana had had to re-audition for "The Sound of Music", as well, just to keep an eye on Santana as Rachel, make sure she doesn't screw up the lyrics, the acting, the blockings, or beat up any of the kids that would piss her off. Santana as Rachel complained about the inordinate amount of singing and perkiness needed for the musical production, which was going to be shown around Christmas, but she'd grudgingly went through the motions, rehearsing with Rachel as Santana, shouting directions at her, delivering her critique of every note that fell flat, every line that she forgot, every blocking that confused her. She couldn't count the many times that Rachel as Santana had told her, "Stage left, Santana! Stage left! Your other stage left! Ugh, how hard is that to figure out?!" so that Santana would usually just drop down on the bed asleep. Rachel had been helpful, always helping Santana with the vocal warm-ups, vocalizations, lyrics and melody. She'd taught her a few techniques in singing, taught her the proper breathing technique so she can sing properly.

Santana had a harder time rejoining the clubs as Rachel. She was laughed at when she tried to join celibacy club, led by Quinn and the Cheerios, also led by Quinn, had outright rejected her. Quinn had looked at her as if she were some second-rate, two-bit, filthy, redneck, white trash nobody and she seemed disgusted just being in the same room as Santana, except now she is Rachel. She knew Quinn had always been a bitch, but to see Quinn from this whole other angle where she had only contempt and loathing for the rest of humanity. It's mildly disturbing and perhaps a bit of an eye-opener.

* * *

Now, as they take their seats in English class, which both Santana and Rachel are surprised they both had, where Sam, Blaine, Artie and Kurt are also classmates.

Already Sam, Blaine, Artie and Kurt are gathered around in the back, chatting.

"Jonathan 'Pa' Kent, in Man of Steel" Sam says. "That was one of the most pointless."

"Dude, no, Obi Wan Kenobi," Artie says now.

"Dude, that guy from Mockingjay," Blaine says now. "Hunger Games. Pretty pointless, as much as I know."

"Oh, there's also Gene Hackman in 'The Poseidon Adventure'," Kurt says.

"Dude, Will Smith in 'I am Legend'," Blaine says now. "Although to be fair, that whole movie was pretty stupid."

"Oh, also Jean Grey's death in X-2! Gandalf's in Lord of the Rings! Shepherd's in Mass Effect 3! That guy played by Alan Tudyk in Firefly! Ripley in Alien 3!" Sam says. "Padme/Amidala in the 'Star Wars' prequels! So pointless and stupid! Oh! And Joss Whedon character! Tara comes to mind!"

Artie looks at him. "Dude, you are on fire!"

Rachel and Santana arrive in the middle of this discussion and Rachel says, "Hi, what are you guys talking about?" They'd all stopped, looked at Rachel and Santana and waved or nodded or muttered greetings in acknowledgement before they turn back to whatever it is they are talking about.

* * *

It had been hard to convince the guys that Santana as Rachel was an okay person to hang out with. The first time Rachel as Santana had brought her to Lima Bean, where they usually hang out, they were met with silence, then incredulity, then suspicion and now, Santana thinks, tolerance, and maybe grudging acceptance.

Santana as Rachel had told them then they were doing a science project together, which is met by silence followed by everyone recalling a favorite Santana moment.

Artie had said, "You used to put my head in the toilet bowl in the boy's toilet and flush it, with my head still in it, when we were in grade school."

"You and your friends used to duct tape me to the toilet bowl in grade school," Kurt had said.

"You call me trouty mouth," Sam had said. "You said if someone needed to have their pickle jars opened, or have their babies bald heads shined or their shoes shined, then I'm the guy to call. And you said my mouth was so big I could swallow the sun... In fact, you still call me trouty mouth..." Santana doesn't know what to say to that. Then Sam says, "And you kind of hate me because I'm dating your friend, Brittany."

Rachel and Santana had been silent, not knowing what to say. Clearly, Sam is unaware of the depth of this supposed "friendship" Santana has with Brittany. Later Rachel would tell Santana, "Friends? I'm pretty sure you're more than that..." to which Santana had said "Sex is not dating" and Rachel had smirked and said, "And yeah, if it were, you and Brittany would be dating..."

Santana doesn't know what to say to that.

"Why are you guys suddenly friends? What's going on?" Artie asks now.

"Yes, you don't even talk to each other," Blaine says now. "I mean, granted the throwing of slushies on someone's person requires zero talking, so..."

"Yes, and when you do, it's usually Santana telling Rachel, 'That's my seat, _bitch_' or 'Move, _nerd_' or whatever," Kurt adds.

Santana blushes. Rachel doesn't know what to say.

"Anyway," Santana as Rachel says now, "That's all in the past. Santana is reformed now...in fact..she's planning to form a group called..." and here she turns to Rachel, who is glaring at her, "The Bully Whips, to stop people from bullying other people..."

They had had to have a private closed doors meeting to decide Santana's fate before they all decide to let Santana into the club that same day. Santana though doesn't know whether she should be happy or not about it as, after they unceremoniously let Rachel as Santana into the club, all the guys turn back to their discussion.

"Dude! Let's just match pitch!" Blaine says now. "_La!_"

"Naw! Let's beatbox!" Sam says now.

"Ugh, that's so...I can't even..." Kurt says now.

"Actually, studies show that beatboxing helps singers 'cause it doesn't strain the chords as much and stuff," Artie says now.

So the boys end up matching pitch and beatboxing at the same time.

Santana leans over to Rachel as everyone matches pitch and says, "Are they always like this?"

"Yes."

"Am I going to expect the same level of geekiness and dorkiness in your other clubs?"

"Yes. They're also pretty much the same members."

"_Fuck._"

* * *

Now, Sam can casually answer that question whilst Santana is present: "The most pointless deaths and or self-sacrifices of all time. I still think Kevin Costner's Jonathan Kent in 'Man of Steel' takes the cake."

Then they all turn to each other as if Santana did not exist and resume chatting. Sam says, "Okay, Keanu Reeves' new movie, 47 Ronin, go!"

"Ugh, I can't even..." Blaine starts now. "Dude, why is Keanu Reeves even in that movie? Why a white guy?"

"Dude, you're white," Sam says.

Blaine scoffs. "Dude, I'm _so_ not."

"Oh, right," Sam says now. "You're right about that. All the Japanese stuff is a bit murky, like, they don't explain all the stuff about the samurai and the ronin and the shogun, I mean, you'd at least have to be familiar with Bushido to know that stuff. It's like no one consulted the Japanese when they made it."

"Was it like that one time they made that Japanese geisha movie and had Chinese actresses star as Japanese women?" Blaine says. "Proving again that Hollywood thinks we're all alike..."

"I did like that Pacific Rim girl who's like the sexy witch girl who may or may not be some foxy lesbian who's always trying to seduce the girl," Artie says.

Everyone looks at him.

"What? It's hot," Artie says.

"You're a pig, Abrams," Rachel says now.

Artie blushes.

"Anyway," Sam says, "Nothing in that movie makes sense. Everything seems random and unexplained. And they like to talk about honor a lot. Also it was pretty dumb and bad. And I mean, not in that Nicolas Cage kind of so bad it's good, kind of movie, but it's so bad that watching it again, could make it even worse."

"Aw, and I was planning to watch it!" Rachel says now, disappointed.

Everyone looks at her. Rachel shrugs. "What? Keanu Reeves, samurai swords, Japan, what's not to like?"

"Fair point," Blaine says.

"Yeah, but it's like, if the Japanese were making a film of D-Day, starring a Japanese person, featuring a sexy Queen Elizabeth, a machine-gun wielding Shakespeare, dying Allied soldiers exploding into poppies, the Loch Ness monster & John Wayne," Sam explains now. "It's like a film of 9-11 with demons flying dragons into the twin towers."

"Uh, that sounds amazing!" Rachel says now.

"We were actually trying to convince you not to watch it," Sam says now.

"Whatever, worst movies you've ever watched, go!" Blaine says now.

"Mortal Instruments: City of Bones," Kurt says.

"Lone Ranger," Sam says. "And also Oz The Great and Powerful and Jack the Giant Slayer."

"Nothing beats 'After Earth' though," Blaine says.

"Is that better or worse than 'Elysium' or 'Oblivion'?" Artie asks.

"It is the _worst_," Blaine says. "Scientology kills the joy of watching films, is what I think."

As they listen to the others, Rachel starts to fidget and clears her throat and Santana has spent a considerable amount of time with her to realize that Rachel is gearing to tell her something. She waits. Rachel does not disappoint.

"Um, so I've been in your house a few weeks now..." Rachel hesitantly begins.

"Yeah?" Santana says, affecting that bored, slightly annoyed tone she normally uses for Rachel, to discourage whatever she wants to say.

Rachel thinks it's an invitation to continue speaking, so she does. "And I have rarely seen your mother in all that time apart from that time I pretended to introduce you to her and stuff. Granted I'm a good cook, and I'm pretty competent in the kitchen and I can fend for myself, my dads taught me the rudiments of cooking and I've had to learn because it's so hard to find decent vegan food and for you know...when I go and live in New York and make it big and...but Thanksgiving is coming up and then there's Christmas...which I don't particularly care for since I'm Jewish and we celebrate Hannukah but Christmas is so ingrained in our culture I'd have no choice but to celebrate it and..."

"Is there a point to all this?" Santana interrupts.

"Where's your mom?" Rachel asks, without missing a beat. "I mean, I hardly see her. _Ever_. Is she, like, the CEO of some company or something? Is she in jail? Is she some kind of superhero living a double life? Does she have some second family somewhere that you don't' know about? Is she in some sort of trouble? I mean..."

Santana shuts her up with a glare before she says, "Okay, again, stop talking. No, she's not in any sort of trouble. She's just very busy with work. She's a consultant and she goes around the country helping companies get back on track and stuff... she's usually away most of the time, that's all..."

Rachel is quiet for a time, mulling this over, before she looks at Santana, tilts her head and says, "Doesn't that bother you?"

"Doesn't what bother me?"

"That your mother is never around? And that your father is in New York and isn't around either? I mean I've been in your house a few weeks and I really appreciate that you come hang out with me or spend the nights sleeping on the couch or in your Mom's bedroom but you can't actually spend the whole entire time there because you might get grounded or whatever so I'm pretty much alone most times, but it seems kind of..." Rachel hesitates, not knowing how to phrase the next part of her sentence, before she says, "_Lonely._.."

It is now Santana's turn to be quiet, completely not expecting what Rachel is saying. Sitting there beside her, earnest, nut brown eyes looking at Santana, Santana can feel herself blush, more at being caught speechless, than anything, because how do you explain something as complicated as Santana's family life?

Rachel had a taste of it first hand when she'd met Santana's mom for the first time. They'd both been hanging out in Santana's living room, when they hear the keys turn in the lock and Santana mutters under her breath, "It's my mom", in this tone of voice that perplexes Rachel as they wait for Santana's mother enter. Santana dares not look at Rachel or her mother, and chooses instead to focus on watching the "The Mirror Has Two Faces", the many concessions she's had to put up with since being forced by their unusual circumstances to spend time together. She grudgingly admits Rachel as Santana is doing wonders for her grades, but it is not doing wonders for her extracurricular activities, her social life or her love life, as due to their unnatural circumstances, Rachel had suggested that they lie low with both Quinn and Brittany for a while. "Given the fact that both girls have been intimate with you, I'm pretty sure they'll know the difference between you and me...so unless you have a better plan, I suggest you put your love life on hold and keep it in your pants for the meantime." Santana had glared at her then, but had grudgingly admitted that she was probably right. Rachel as Santana had thus far been good at avoiding Quinn, even during Cheerios practice. Santana had offered texting Quinn on her phone, to tell her, she needed some time alone to think, that she needed space and Rachel had shown Quinn's text, which was a short and terse, "Fuck you." Brittany had been more accommodating via text, but where Quinn usually glared at Rachel as Santana whenever she saw her in the halls, Brittany had this sad, disappointed, resigned look, especially since Rachel as Santana had again forgotten to meet Brittany and Miss Holiday. So yes, Santana's love life is on hold, but she can't help but think that this is probably a good idea, too, because taking a break from both Brittany and Quinn helps her think as well.

Santana's mother though is a whole other thing though.

Santana knows her mother knows her inside and out, and would definitely know something is up if there's a noticeable personality transplant in Rachel. Rachel, to her credit though, exercises a great amount of restraint, only smiles and waves at Santana's mother. She thinks it's okay, they've fooled her mother, and she knows Rachel's taken great pains to copy the basic mannerisms of Santana, but suddenly her mother stops and stares at Rachel as Santana, not knowing what to say, before she smiles back and waves and asks who Santana as Rachel is and if she wants to stay over for dinner. It's one of those rare moments when Santana actually has to go home and sleep because her mother is home, and Rachel doesn't tell her what they talked about.

Santana's relationship with her mother, her _parents_, basically, is quite different from Rachel's parents. Rachel's parents are present, all the time, in Rachel's life, from breakfast, to dinner, to after dinner, with dinner conversation that includes having to talk about what Rachel's day was like, if she needed help with homework, or with her science project or with reviewing for the Math State Olympiad or the Physics State Olympiad. There is a time just after dinner and just before the Berrys watch television, where they have a session at the piano, a large, shiny black Steinway one in the living room, where they play some Broadway showtunes, and sing to their heart's content, much to Santana as Rachel's horror. Rachel walks her through this, and though the Berrys find Rachel as Santana's prominence in the Berrys household, hanging out with Santana as Rachel and having dinner and having sleepovers sometimes, they learn to tolerate her. Rachel as Santana teaches her a bit of piano, as she is expected to play the piano, but Santana as Rachel isn't interested, but Rachel persists. A few times though, Santana hears Rachel as Santana sing some non-Broadway showtunes that make her stop and stare and think long after Rachel has sung.

One of the more unforgettable ones was Rachel singing Adele's "Make You Feel My Love", Jason Mraz's "I Won't Give You Up" and Christina Perri's "A Thousand Years", which surprises Santana as she thought Rachel only knew Broadway and Barbra Streisand and of course, liked Twilight and its soundtrack. Rachel is surprised that Santana is even aware of these musicians, as she doesn't like music in the first place. Sometimes, when Santana as Rachel sneaks into Rachel's house after dark and they spend the night in Santana's house, they pass the time with Rachel singing some songs acapella. Even Santana has to admit Rachel's voice was made to fill concert halls and Broadway stages. She has a beautiful voice.

Right now, Santana affects some bravado, before she shrugs and says, "Nah, it's fine. I'm used to it. Dad's a doctor – a real one, not any of those, like, animal doctors or tooth doctors or whatever, and Mom loves what she does and she gets paid good for it and..."

"Well," Rachel says, correcting her.

"Well?"

Rachel rolls her eyes. "If you're going to be me, your grammar should be impeccable. There was this one time you told me, 'What about you and I?' and it just..."

Santana scowls. "Stop talking."

They both turn towards the others again and can hear Artie speaking. They don't notice that the group has fallen silent, looking like they're anticipating something. Both girls look at them, and the guys look at Artie, who clears his throat and quietly asks, "Um, we kind of have a question for both of you..."

Rachel as Santana smiles and asks, "What?"

"We don't know how you're going to take it and we hope you're not going to get mad or freak out or something..." Artie continues, now looking uncertain and a bit afraid of Santana.

Santana as Rachel rolls her eyes. "Just...ask the stupid _ff_- _freaking_ question..."

"Are you and Santana together?" Artie asks the question so fast and so earnestly, with zero malice, and so quietly that both Rachel and Santana barely hear him and when they realize what he is asking, they both blush. When both do not offer an answer, Artie quickly adds, "Because you're always together and up to this moment, Rachel, you haven't actually given any indication that you're gay...but if you are, everything makes so much sense now and..."

"You guys make a cute couple," Sam adds.

"And we should totally throw you a coming out party or something," Blaine says. "Although Kurt is really upset that you didn't come out to him first."

As Santana as Rachel start to shake her head in what Rachel as Santana can only guess is a look of disgust, Rachel quickly says, "No, we're not together. And we're both not gay. We're just working on a project together..."

"Science project, I know," Artie says, "But there's really no other reason for you guys to hang out for an inordinate amount of time considering you guys absolutely have nothing in common and Santana, no offense, but you're actually no saint and you used to bully Rachel and it kind of feels random and well..."

"We actually didn't even think you were...gay, but..." Sam says with a grin. "So...congratulations!"

"Congratulations!" Artie, Blaine and Kurt follow.

"I'm not gay," Rachel as Santana quickly says, followed by Santana as Rachel.

"Dude, now that we think about it, you so are," Sam says now. He starts to tick off a few things on his fingers, "I mean, dude, aside from your weird obsession on Finn Hudson, you kind of barely register interest in any guy...and you kind of...really pay attention when like there's a girl in a cheer leading skirt or something..."

"I'm not gay!" both Santana and Rachel say at the same time again.

Sam grins again. "It's cool dude, we don't like labels, too."

"Yeah, love is love," Blaine says now with an encouraging smile and Kurt nods in assent.

"We'll support you no matter what," Artie adds.

Rachel as Santana quickly interrupts this and says, "While we really thank you for your support and acceptance, and while I, too, do not believe in labels, there's really nothing to support or accept or _label_, even, because Rachel and I are _not_ together. I repeat, we are not together. She's not into me, I'm not her type, we're just friends, and I'm pretty sure she'd rather die than be caught dead with me. So there. We're leaving it at that."

There is an awkward moment when the two girls blush hard and the guys only smile before Artie breaks the silence by saying, "Okay, whatever. Glaciers move faster than you but whatever." He turns to everyone else and says, "Moving on. Best movies you've seen recently, go!"

"Hunger Games: Catching Fire!" Sam says.

"Pacific Rim!" Artie says.

"The Conjuring," Blaine says.

"That movie was scary," Kurt says.

"Exactly."

"Okay, next question, how do you know if you're actually asleep or awake? Matrix style," Sam says now.

"Dude, it's Rachel's turn," Artie says now. "It's her turn to ask a question related to pop culture."

Everyone turns to Santana as Rachel, waiting for a question. Santana had spent enough time with Rachel and the guys to know that a requirement for X-Club and one of their overall activities is pretty much out-geek each other.

Santana hadn't thought of a question to ask, but then a thought comes up to her and she says, "What do you guys think about body swaps?"

As Rachel as Santana turns to glare at Santana as Rachel, everyone stops to think about this, considering Rachel's question, and the silence stretches before Artie breaks the silence with a, "That's an interesting question..." his hand already deep in his pocket, searching his phone for more information.

"Yeah, very interesting," Blaine echoes, to which Kurt nods, as both fish their cellphones out of their own backpacks.

Santana as Rachel just rolls her eyes.

"Now that I think about it, that's like the most random question you've ever asked, but body swaps are very interesting as a concept, though sadly still not entirely possible in real life," Sam comments as he takes out his iPhone and starts to thumb through it, pauses before he says, seemingly more to himself as he knits his eyebrows, deep in thought, "Body swaps are a very fascinating storytelling device, and have been used as far back as H.P. Lovecraft for purposes of fiction." He looks up now at Santana as Rachel and says, "There are two distinct kinds of body swaps, one magical, the other scientific. Magical body swaps usually happen through magical items and wishes, like say..."

"Freaky Friday, The Change-Up and Hot Chick," Artie supplies.

Sam nods. "While scientific ones happen through gadgets or whatever, where experiments go wrong and stuff."

"Like Face Off," Artie dutifully supplies.

"Yes, yes, whatever, but if for example, two people switch bodies, why does it usually happen and how do you get your own body back?" Santana as Rachel asks earnestly now. She is glad that such a stupid question now wouldn't be considered stupid in front of this group of people. She's actually grudgingly beginning to like this group of guys with their embarrassingly nerdy, geeky, dorky demeanor – it's such a welcome breath of fresh air from the boys, make-up, clothes, shopping, diets that she usually has to hear or pretend to care and talk about with the other girls, especially on the squad. Not once has she talked about those topics with Rachel either.

Everyone stops to consider this question again before they furiously work on their cellphones and then Sam looks up, shrugs, and says, "We don't know dude."

"Yeah, I mean, it's a storytelling device, nothing more, so, yeah," Artie says.

"Although sci-fi body swaps tend to have some moralistic, pedantic overtones," Blaine offers when he sees Santana as Rachel's face drop in disappointment.

"Yeah, and when it's magical, there's probably some reason why there was a body swap in the first place," Sam adds. "Like, maybe both parties need to expand their world views or gain a new appreciation of each other's lives, by literally walking in the other's shoes, and once that's been done, they usually switch back."

"Alternately, you can just find said magic item and hope it turns you back," Artie says.

When the others turn to more general topics of interest – upcoming sequels to Avengers, Amazing Spiderman and The Hobbit, as well as the reboots of Robocop, NeverEnding Story and so on, Santana as Rachel leans to Rachel as Santana and whispers, "_You _need to expand your world views and fast, or we're stuck like this forever."

"How do you know you're not the one in need of expanding?" Rachel snits back.

Santana is still thinking of a comeback to that one, but then something happens like Brittany S. Pierce, _her _Brittany S. Pierce, comes bounding in, long, blonde hair tousled and flowing down her shoulders, looking all gorgeous and tall in her tight, tight, low waist jeans, blouse and jacket and she thinks it's not going to be fine. She at first registers surprise that Santana is hanging out with them, and Santana can actually see her hesitate for a second when she catches sight of her from a few yards away, but then she smiles and waves, and though she makes a bee-line for Sam, the first one she greets is Santana in this characteristic, Brittany way that's all sweet and cute and it makes Santana's heart flutter a bit and for a moment she gets confused, until someone says, "Most underrated movies ever, go!" and the guys shout, "Treasure Planet!" "Iron Giant!" "Cloud Atlas!" and Brittany says, "The Adventures of Baron Munchausen!"

"Oh, god, I love that movie!" Blaine and Kurt both say at the same time.

"You would! That's borderline gay!" Artie says now.

And that sets off an argument that takes the attention away from Santana and the other girls and Santana is left to her own confusing thoughts and feelings, ignoring the puzzled look Brittany occasionally throws Rachel, who she thinks is Santana, as Rachel chats with the others.

* * *

Student assembly had been a blast.

Their performance had been moved to a later date so Santana, Rachel and the other Glee members could practice the routine and the singing more, much to Rachel's (now as Santana)'s chagrin and embarrassment. It wasn't that Rachel wasn't used to these kinds of songs, but it was just that she had envisioned a Glee Club that leaned on the classier side of music, with Broadway songs being sung and more appropriate choreography being danced, and she'd said as much but the other kids had glared at her and she had been the lone dissenting voice as the other kids gyrated and air humped and pretty much did everything but simulated sex on their choreography, without Mr. Schuester's knowledge or consent. But that teacher was always off on some mid-life crisis issue or whatever that nobody cared about so they were pretty much left to their own devices. At first, when Rachel as Santana had heard actual Santana's plan, all Rachel can think of, eyes wide in shock, mouth open in surprise, face red with shame and embarrassment, is that she will kill Santana, but later, as actual Santana tried to persuade her, she had to grudgingly admit that Santana's argument – that the mash-up would actually attract more members, which had been Mr. Schuester's original intention anyway, had its merits.

When Santana, Rachel, Artie, Tina, Mike, Kurt, Blaine and Sam dance in their blue shirts and jeans to the tune of their mash-up of "Push It", "I Wanna Sex You Up" and "Let's Talk About Sex", the whole student body roared in approval and appreciation and Principal Figgins, Coach Sue, Mr. Schuester and the other teachers were all in shock.

Over in the bleachers, unknown to both Santana and Rachel, Quinn Fabray has seen the performance and is furious with Santana, while Brittany is confused, and over at the sidelines, David Karofsky does not know what to say and Noah Puckerman sit there staring at Santana and Rachel smiling at each other, his head tilted to one side, arms crossed in front of him as if he was trying to figure out a complicated puzzle.

After a lengthy talking to from a very upset Mr. Schuester and a mildly upset Principal Figgins threatening detention and a complete list of new set lists pre-approved by his pastor that only contained rainbows and God in it, they are let go to have lunch.

* * *

Rachel as Santana barely has time to compose her own talking to to Santana when Quinn Fabray appears out of nowhere, and manhandles her to one of the empty classrooms near them.

"What on earth, Quinn?" Rachel as Santana demands now.

"I wanna know what's fucking going on," Quinn demands now.

"What? What do you mean?" Rachel asks nervously now,trying to put as much distance between her and Quinn, making for the teacher's desk as Quinn stands there, arms folded in front of her, scowling at Rachel.

"I wanna know what that fucking cryptic 'I want some space' text message is all about, and why you're spending so much time with Manhands and are you pissed off I'm going to the prom with some other guy? Because we decided we'd go there separately and then leave together but..."

And here Quinn stops, unable to go on and Rachel can see, but barely, the hurt on Quinn's face.

"Quinn..." Rachel begins now, not knowing what to say.

"Are we breaking up?" Quinn asks now.

Rachel is flabbergasted now to say the least, not knowing what else to say. Santana would probably kick her ass if she didn't fix this, but how could she fix this if she didn't exactly know what was really going on between Santana and Quinn? Were both serious about their relationship? Did they actually think it was going to survive the dramas of high school? The challenges of college and adult life?

Quinn must think of this as a "yes" because Rachel can now see tears pool in Quinn's eyes as she says, "Because that thing with Sam...that was just the one time...and nothing happened...I swear...we were both drunk and we just made out and that was it...and I thought we were past this and we'd work through this and I thought we were doing fine but you suddenly spend a lot of time with Manhands Berry and I don't know if that's your way of getting back at me and I know I probably deserve that but it's so unfair and you're my best friend and I know sometimes you can be weird with all that emotional constipation but..."

Oh, _crap_, Rachel thinks now. Quinn made out with Sam, Brittany's boyfriend. Rachel suddenly feels nauseated and faint as she leans back on the desk.

When she doesn't say anything, Quinn must think the worst now, because she says, voice breaking, "I'm sorry, I'm really sorry... If I could take it all back I would...Could you just...say something please...?"

Quinn makes to move towards Rachel, but Rachel puts her hand up and says, "Can you give me some time please? I kind of...I need to get some air..."

* * *

Rachel rushes out of the room before Quinn can say something and slams right into Karofsky.

"I'm sorry," Rachel mutters.

"Hey, it's fine, Santana," Karofsky says.

Rachel is nodding, ignoring Karofsky, bu then Karofsky says, "Santana, can we talk? Because we were supposed to kind of go out Saturday night, to Scandals, but you haven't be texting me or whatever, and I thought maybe something's wrong or I made you mad or something..." he leans over and says, "Please don't tell...I mean...my dad's going to kill me and..."

Rachel is confused at what Karofsky is saying, and then to her horror, she realizes Santana is probably also dating Karofsky and she thinks to herself, Ugh, Santana and So that's why Santana doesn't want to say she's gay...

* * *

Rachel as Santana barely has time to confront Santana as Rachel at lunch time over the events of the day, after a visibly shocked Mr. Schuester defends Glee to Principal Figgins when, during their lunch time, Rick the Stick and Azimio approach them.

"Hey, dyke! Can I join you and your girlfriend?" Rick the Stick shouts.

Santana as Rachel sees the ball Rick the Stick is holding and catches it with one hand after Rick the Stick throws it at her and everyone is stunned as she throws the ball back and the ball hits Rick the Stick in the balls. In a second, Santana as Rachel has her knee on Rick the Stick's groin, her elbow on his throat.

"What the hell, Berry?" Rick the Stick says now, trying to struggle against Santana.

Santana is surprisingly strong.

"You throw another fucking slushie on my face and I'll break both your arms and your legs and make sure you never play hockey again," Santana says back, pushing her arm harder against his neck.

When she lets Rick the Stick go, he screams, "Dyke!" again which makes Santana as Rachel stop, turn around and look at Rick the Stick.

When she turns around, she notices the crowd of other high school kids gathered around to witness her single-handedly manhandling Rick the Stick, her surroundings, or Rachel standing on the sidelines, afraid, and that it is almost time for the next class and that she is so red and furious her heart is beating so fast and the adrenaline is coursing through her veins. Rachel just looks at her, confused and fearful.

She instantly knows Rachel doesn't want her to get detention, it would reflect badly on her permanent record, so she just takes a deep breath to calm herself and then she says, loudly, so that everyone can hear it:

"You know, Rick, I've been studying psychology – it's not actually an exact science like Physics or Chemistry or whatever," Santana says, stopping only to realize she's beginning to speak like Rachel, and then she continues, "And you know what you are? You're a bully." Santana stops as the kids stop and listen to her, some of them making approving and encouraging noises. She puts up middle finger and says, "And psychologists say, there are three reasons why bullies exist. One, the bully's brain is so tiny, he's incapable of self-control and thus have the need to act out aggressively," this makes everyone laugh, as Santana puts up her index finger and says, "Two, underneath all that bravado is just a little girl waiting to get out," this makes everyone laugh even harder, as she puts up her pinkie and says, "And three, Rick the Stick is a bully because he or she has a tiny wiener..."

* * *

Santana as Rachel thankfully doesn't get detention for her little stunt in the cafeteria, but Rick the Stick's humiliation is the final coffin on his questionable popularity in the first place. The cafeteria erupts in a roar of approval, kids clapping at Santana's speech, as Santana as Rachel grins and cockily takes a bow. She tries to talk to Rachel as Santana, who didn't seem at all pleased at what she had done, but she is nowhere to be found.

Rachel is grateful that Santana had stood up to her and for a while people look at both of them with renewed respect. But she has Quinn and Brittany on her mind, wondering how to talk to both of them, and feeling the urge to Santana as well. She doesn't think she can handle this any longer, being Santana – there is just a lot of issues here that she doesn't want to deal with – foremost of which is Santana's mother, looking haggard and exhausted, and not knowing how to deal with Rachel as Santana. There are moments when she thinks Santana's mother wants to talk to her, and once, her mother says, "Santana, can we talk? I know we had that big fight before Halloween, and I know you're still upset, but maybe we can work this out...I know it's been tough for you, but we have to figure out a way to live together without blowing up on each other. I'm so sorry." She doesn't really want to know what the fight had been about, and Santana hadn't wanted to talk to her about it. And there's also her own confusing thoughts and feelings about Santana, Quinn, Brittany, Santana's mother, her own life.

As she goes to the Glee practice room thinking about all these whilst going through some news in her phone, she sees what she thinks is a picture of the statue. She shows it to Santana and Santana nods. They both know they have to go to New York now, or risk being stuck like this for life.

But then, they go to Glee practice that afternoon, after their last class, and they see Quinn, Brittany, Puck and Karofsky inside the Glee classroom.

Mr. Schuester excitedly introduces them as the new members of Glee Club.

All Santana can think of is, Oh, _fuck, this could not get any worse_.

All Rachel can think of is, _Crap, when it rains, it pours_.

* * *

**_A/N:_**

**_That's it for this chapter. Thanks for your patience, and for reading and reviewing._**

**_Many thanks for the follows, favorites and reviews (special shoutout to Pictureofsuccess and kutee, as always). Many thanks to my beta DragonsWillFly as always for everything._**

**_Apologies for taking so long, got distracted by reading all of the Hunger Games books in one sitting. :) Hope this was worth the wait._**

**_Happy New Year!_**


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